Preamble

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

BRITISH MUSEUM

The Minister of Health (Mr. Ernest Brown): I have been asked by the Trustees of the British Museum to present a Petition which they have to submit to this House annually, explaining the financial position and praying for aid. The Petition recites the funded income of the Trustees and points out that the establishment is necessarily attended with an expense far beyond the annual production of the funds, and the Trust cannot with benefit to the public be carried out without the aid of Parliament. It concludes with this prayer:
Your petitioners therefore humbly pray your Honourable House to grant them such further support towards enabling them to carry on the execution of the Trust reposed in them by Parliament for the general benefit of learning and useful knowledge as to your House shall seem meet."—[King's Recommendation signified].
Petition referred to the Committee of Supply.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL WAR EFFORT

Disabled Persons

Mr. Hewlett: asked the Minister of Labour whether he will arrange for disabled persons, who are unfit for work under ordinary industrial conditions, to make a contribution to the war effort by providing sheltered employment in establishments run by the Ministries of Labour, Supply or Production and engaged on assembly or other appropriate jobs?

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Ernest Bevin): Arrangements are to be made under the post-war scheme to provide sheltered employment in special workshops, under non-competitive conditions, for the relatively small proportion of the disabled whose disability is so severe as

to preclude any kind of normal employment. I doubt if it is possible to make progress on those lines in war conditions for these exceptional cases, and the best way to help them is to press on with the present arrangements for finding them employment on work they can do in establishments employing mainly non-disabled workers and in various schemes for organising work to suit the difficult personal circumstances of individual workers.

Agricultural Workers' Cottages (Labour Supply)

Mr. De la Bére: asked the Minister of Labour, whether he can now make some statement as regards the allocation of labour, skilled and unskilled, that will be available for the erection of farm cottages in connection with the Government's proposed scheme?

Mr. Bevin: Yes, Sir. The Government building programme has been adjusted to the resources of building labour expected to remain available, and allowance has been made for the labour necessary for the construction of these cottages. The supply of labour will be arranged, when required, through the local offices of the Ministry in the usual way.

Mr. De la Bére: Is my right hon. Friend aware that it is being suggested in authoritative quarters that the cause of the delay is due to the difficulty over labour, and does he not realise that an adequate supply of labour is necessary for the cottages and that these are vitally necessary? Why is it that agriculture has always to take second place to everything else? Food is vitally important.

Mr. Bevin: I do not know that I can make an adequate answer to that eloquent speech.

Coal Strippers, Bowhill (Medical Examination)

Mr. Gallacher: asked the Minister of Labour, who was responsible for sending several Bowhill strippers for medical examination; what action was taken by his representative in Fife; and on whose advice did he take it?

Mr. Bevin: The instructions were given by me, and action was taken by my local representatives strictly in accordance with these instructions.

Mr. Gallacher: Are we to understand from the Minister's reply that he ordered the local officer to take the step of sending key men for military service without consulting the Minister of Fuel, the Fuel Controller or anyone associated with the men's organisation? And will he refrain from anything of that sort in the future?

Mr. Bevin: I ought to make it clear that men of military age are soldiers. They are deferred for national work. When it is reported to me that they are no longer following that national work, their deferment ceases, and it is my duty then to issue instructions for their medical examination.

Mr. Gallacher: Will the Minister say who reported it to him or to his local officer that these men were no longer following their occupation? That is what I want to know. Can I have an answer?

Mr. Bevin: I do not reveal who reports anything to me. The point is the direction to people who are off the pay roll and are no longer reported as being in employment. I have immediately to make a choice, and if they are not following their employment, they must carry out what this House says they shall carry out.

Mr. Sloan: Is the Minister not aware that at this colliery a very serious dispute was in operation, and is it now the policy of my right hon. Friend to resolve disputes by sending those in dispute for medical examination?

Mr. Bevin: No, Sir, there was no dispute reported at this colliery at all. These men were reported to me as having left the colliery. I acted on the basis of their having left. They were not in employment or on the pay roll of any colliery, so far as I knew, when I issued the instruction.

Mr. Gallacher: In view of the unsatisfactory nature of the Minister's reply, I propose to raise the matter at an early opportunity. I want to find out who reported this matter.

Employment Agencies

Sir Leonard Lyle: asked the Minister of Labour whether, under the Control of Engagement Order which permits, as an alternative to application by women to

employment exchanges, recourse to employment agencies approved by his Department, he accepts applications from individual firms; and what are the conditions governing the basis of approval?

Mr. Bevin: It is open to any individual firm of employment agents to apply for approval under the Control of Engagement Order. The principles on which agencies may be approved are set out in the replies given to the hon. Member for Stourbridge (Mr. R. Morgan) on 29th January, 1942, and to the hon. and gallant Member for King's Norton (Major Peto) on 10th March, 1942, of which I am sending copies to my hon. Friend.

Sir L. Lyle: Is it not a fact that practically none of the commercial fee-charging agencies have been approved so far; that, of the 28 agencies which have been approved, 19 are universities and the rest are industrial organisations; and that no commercial fee-charging agencies have been approved?

Mr. Bevin: That is quite true. It is very difficult to fit them into this war task.

General Sir George Jeffreys: asked the Minister of Labour the names of the 28 agencies which have been approved under the Employment of Women (Control of Engagement) Order.

Mr. Bevin: With my hon. and gallant Friend's permission, I will circulate a list of the approved agencies in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Sir G. Jeffreys: Does that list include any of the well-known and established workers' agencies which were functioning as such before the war?

Mr. Bevin: I think not.

Sir G. Jeffreys: Is there any reason why they should not be included?

Mr. Bevin: I answered that question a few moments ago, in reply to another hon. Member. It is very difficult to fit them in for the placing of labour in connection with the war effort.

Following is the list:




Approved Agencies.
Type of Person to be placed.
Type of Employment in which to be placed.


1.
University of Aberdeen Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of the University of Aberdeen.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


2.
Birmingham University Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of Birmingham University.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


3.
University of Bristol Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of the University of Bristol.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


4.
Cambridge University Women's Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of Cambridge University.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


5.
University of Durham Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of Durham.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


6.
University of Edinburgh Appointments Committee.
Students and graduates of University of Edinburgh.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


7.
The University, Glasgow Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of Glasgow.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


8.
University of Leeds Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of Leeds.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


9.
University of Liverpool Appointments Bureau.
Students and graduates of University of Liverpool.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


10.
University of London Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of London.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


11.
Manchester University Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of Manchester University.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


12.
University College, Nottingham Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University College, Nottingham.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


13.
Oxford University Women's Appointments Committee.
Students and graduates of Oxford University.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


14.
The University Reading, Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of Reading.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


15.
University of Sheffield Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of Sheffield.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


16.
University College, Southampton Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University College, Southampton.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


17.
The University of St. Andrews Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of St. Andrews.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


18.
University College of the South West of England Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University College of South West of England.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


19.
University of Wales Appointments Board.
Students and graduates of University of Wales.
Vital war work suitable to their capacities.


20.
Industrial Welfare Society
Trained or experienced Personnel Managers.
Personnel Managers



 Trained or experienced Welfare Supervisors.
 Welfare Supervisors


21.
Institute of Hospital Almoners.
Certificated Hospital Almoners
Hospital Almoners


22.
Society of Women Housing Managers.
(a) Trained Yousing Managers
(a)Housing Managers



(b) Students accepted for training who satisfy the requirements from time to time in force contained in instructions issued by the Minister for students taking courses at Technical colleges and other similar institutions.
(b) Student Housing Managers in offices approved by the Society for training purposes.


23.
Institute of Labour Management.
Trained or experienced Personnel Managers.
Personnel Managers



 Trained or experience Welfare Supervisors.
 Welfare Supervisors


24.
The Society of Radiographers
Registered members of the Society of Radiographers.
Radiographers


25.
Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes.
Any women covered by the Orders, with the exception of single women or widows who are being dealt with under the N.S. Acts.
Any full-time employment in the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes, except ancillary employment in Headquarters and Command Offices, and Distributing Warehouses.







Approved Agencies.
Type of Person to be placed.
Type of Employment in which to be placed.


26.
Association of Psychiatric Social Workers.
Members of the Association of Psychiatric Social Workers.
Psychiatric Social Workers


27.
Central Pharmaceutical War Committee.
(a) Qualified Pharmacists
(a) Pharmacists




(b) Dispensers
(b) Dispensers


(c) Women who have been regularly employed in the handling of drugs and medical and surgical appliances for a minimum period of six months other than those who are liable under the National Service Acts and in the age classes being dealt with under those Acts.
(c) Drug Hands


28.
The Scottish Central Pharmaceutical War Committee.
(a) Qualified Pharmacists
(a) Pharmacists




(b) Dispensers
(b) Dispensers




(c) Women who have been regularly employed in the handling of drugs and medical and surgical appliances for a minimum period of six months other than those who are liable under the National Service Acts and in the age classes being dealt with under those Acts.
(c) Drug Hands

Sir G. Jeffreys: asked the Minister of Labour as Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes is an approved employment agency under the Control of Employment Order and solely enrols applicants for its own service, how it is possible for this primary duty effectively to be combined with its functions as an employment agency; and whether other organisations of a similar character will be similarly treated?

Mr. Bevin: N.A.A.F.I. has been approved in this connection for the purpose only of engaging women for their own staff, and does not operate otherwise as an employment agency. The circumstances of these Institutes are exceptional and would not apply, so far as I know, to any other organisation. Nevertheless, I am reviewing the whole situation as regards these Institutes.

Sir G. Jeffreys: Is N.A.A.F.I. either licensed in London or registered at its address in Surrey? Both of these conditions, I understand, are necessary for employment agencies. Unless they are fulfilled, is N.A.A.F.I. really qualified to act as an employment agency under the Order?

Mr. Bevin: I am indebted to my hon. and gallant Friend for putting down this

Question. As I said, I am reviewing the whole position.

Mr. Evelyn Walkden: Is it not a fact that N.A.A.F.I. has one of the right hon. Gentleman's own officials on the headquarters staff, to ensure that the Regulations are carried out?

Mr. Bevin: I can only repeat that this Question caused me to look into the matter. I am not quite sure that the Regulation is carried out, and I propose to review the position.

Women's Land Army (Recruitment)

Sir Percy Hurd: asked the Minister of Labour how many women his Department has permitted to join the Women's Land Army in each of the past four weeks; and what steps his local officials are taking, especially in the rural areas, to encourage suitable women to undertake this vital form of National Service?

Mr. Bevin: I am informed by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries that the numbers enrolled by the Women's Land Army in England and Wales during each of the past four weeks are 1,005, 917, 933 and 1,083 respectively. The precise number of women submitted to the Women's Land Army by my local offices is not known.


but it is substantially larger than the number enrolled as the result of such submissions. Subject to the satisfaction of other equally urgent labour requirements, every encouragement is given by my local officers to the recruitment of suitable women, especially in rural areas.

Sir P. Hurd: In view of the inadequacy of these numbers, what further steps is the Minister taking to impress on his local officials that the need for more women workers on the land is very urgent?

Mr. Bevin: One of the immediate steps I am taking with my right hon. Friend is to make the conditions more comparable with other bodies, by which recruiting will be made much easier.

Mr. De la Bère: Does the Minister realise the primary importance of agriculture?

Cold Storage Undertakings, Port of London

Mr. Robertson: asked the Minister of Labour whether his attention has been drawn to difficulties which have arisen in regard to the position of cold storage undertakings under the Dock Labour Scheme for the Port of London; and what action he proposes to take in the matter?

Mr. Bevin: Yes, Sir. I am aware of these difficulties, and I have appointed Sir John Forster to conduct an inquiry. His terms of reference are:
to inquire into the application of the Port of London Dock Labour Scheme to cold storage undertakings, and to make recommendations.

Mr. Robertson: Is the Minister aware that there are 20 stores concerned in this question, none of whose premises are dock-side premises, and that none of them have employed any dock labourers nor do they employ casual labourers? Does he feel that at this time a public inquiry such as he suggests is fair to many busy men who have to leave their work of national importance and waste their time?

Mr. Bevin: When a claim comes up requiring investigation, I think the best way of solving it is to have an impartial investigation to help me to arrive at a decision.

Young Workers (Holidays)

Mr. Kenneth Lindsay: asked the Minister of Labour whether he will encourage, wherever possible, the granting of two weeks' holiday for young workers over the next six months so that they may take full advantage of the many open-air pre-service forestry and harvest camps and thus combine a measure of rehabilitation with direct service to the war effort?

Mr. Bevin: As my hon. Friend is aware, the question of annual holiday arrangements is a matter which is normally settled between the employers and unions in the various industries. I am, however, sympathetic on every ground to my hon. Friend's suggestion, and I should like to see the fullest possible opportunity given to young workers to take advantage of these valuable outdoor activities.

Viscountess Astor: Would the Minister be as strong with the young workers as with the old workers? He can make the old people do what he wants; for goodness sake make the young people do what is good for them.

Independent Medical Reports

Mr. Tinker: asked the Minister of Labour what further steps a person can take who is not satisfied with the report of the independent medical man chosen by his Department to submit a report on the man's condition to the local appeal board under the Emergency Powers (Defence) Acts, as there is doubt over this point?

Mr. Bevin: Consideration would be given to any other relevant evidence submitted by such a person, but perhaps my hon. Friend will let me have particulars of any actual case he may have in mind.

Wages (Percentage Increases)

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Minister of Labour the percentage increase in wages since 1939 paid to those employed in the engineering industry on plain time rates, the percentage paid on wages since 1939 to those employed on piecework, the highest percentage increase paid in all industry and the average increase paid in all industry?

Mr. Bevin: The percentage increase in wages varies widely, not only in different industries, but in different occupations, districts and undertakings in those industries,


and the available information is not sufficient to enable me to answer the first three parts of the Question. It is estimated that the average weekly increase in full-time rates of wages from the beginning of the war until the end of February, 1943, was about 33 per cent. or 34 per cent. The latest available information, about average earnings in the principal industries relates to July, 1942. This was published in the "Ministry of Labour Gazette" last December.

Engineering Industry (Tribunal Award)

Mr. Ellis Smith: asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware of the effect on good will of those employed in the engineering industry by the tribunal award of 20th March; will he give the names and professions of those who compose the tribunal; is he satisfied with Subsection (3) paragraph (b) of the award; and that the highly-skilled men are receiving the reward due to them for the great contribution which they have made to the national effort since 1938?

Mr. Bevin: With my hon. Friend's permission, I will circulate a list of the names of the members forming the tribunal, in the recent case relating to wages and conditions in the engineering industry, in the OFFICIAL REPORT. It would be impertinent of me to express any opinion with regard to the award. I have no reason to doubt that both sides of the industry will accept and implement the decisions of the tribunal with good will.

Mr. Kirkwood: Is the Minister aware that before this award was made the engineers were paid, with the basic rate and national bonus, 1s. 813/16d. That was made up of 11¾d. basic rate and 91/16d. national bonus. Now, with the 6s. of the award, which is on the bonus and not on the basic rate, and with £1 taken from the bonus and put on the basic rate, the basic rate for engineers, instead of being 11¾d. per hour will be 1s. 4½d. and 10006d. What is the Minister going to do to clear up the serious discontent throughout the country?

Major-General Sir Alfred Knox: Is the right hon. Gentleman satisfied that men in the Services, who by giving their lives to the country contribute much more to the war effort, get sufficient reward for their services?

Following are the names:

Appointed Members:

The Hon. Mr. Justice Simonds (Chairman), Judge of the Chancery Division, High Court of Justice.

Sir John Forster, barrister at law.

Sir W. David Ross, Provost of Oriel College, Oxford.

Panel Members:

Mr. W. O. R. Holton, of William Holton and Sons Limited, manufacturers of fancy woollens.

Mr. A. M. Wall, J.P., General Secretary, London Society of Compositors.

Gipsies

Mr. Edward Smith: asked the Minister of Labour whether the gipsy population of the United Kingdom is liable to National Registration; and, if not, whether some other means will be devised of making the considerable supply of gipsy labour readily and continuously available to agriculture?

Mr. Bevin: I understand from my right hon. Friend the Minister of Health that gipsies are liable to National Registration. They are also liable to register under the National Service Acts and the Registration for Employment Order. My hon. Friend will appreciate that their migratory habits make it peculiarly difficult to secure that those gipsies who have not been called up are continuously engaged on war work, including agriculture, but I will consider with other interested Departments whether any further steps can usefully be taken with that end in view.

Transferred Workers (Cheap Travel Scheme)

Miss Ward: asked the Minister of Labour whether, in view of his announcement that bank holidays will be two days in order to give war workers the necessary additional holidays, he will arrange for the cheap travel vouchers to be available for transferred workers, so that they may really benefit by the additional holiday concession?

Mr. Bevin: In order to avoid undue congestion on the railways, which would impede essential war traffic, I regret that it is necessary to suspend the operation of the cheap travel scheme for transferred workers, in common with other warrant or voucher schemes, at the Bank Holiday periods. On the other hand,


I would remind my hon. Friend that this year the scheme will be in operation for the whole of the six months April to September inclusive, as compared with the period nth May to 15th September last year.

Miss Ward: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the present arrangement is very disappointing to the transferred workers?

Mr. Bevin: I appreciate that, but the war must go on.

Oral Answers to Questions — POLICE INVESTIGATIONS, NORTH LONDON

Mrs. Cazalet Keir: asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether, in view of the apology tendered to Mr. Somers, of 47, Marquess Road, N.1, by an inspector of police for the mistake made over his identity card, he will see that the plain clothes police officers, 250G and 510G, are reprimanded for the hectoring manner in which they carried out their investigations; and will he give an assurance that in future only men fully conversant with their duties are employed in such important work?

The Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Herbert Morrison): The fact that an apology was tendered does not imply that the police officers carried out their investigations in an improper manner, and I regret that my hon. Friend has made this allegation, for which there is no foundation. As the hon. Lady has already been informed by my right hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary, the circumstances were fully investigated by the Commissioner of Police, who found no justification for reprimanding or admonishing them. I am informed that both officers had considerable experience of this type of work.

Mrs. Keir: Is my right hon. Friend aware that these two plain clothes police officers accused Mr. Somers of being a deserter and behaved in a very bullying manner to his wife? Surely my right hon. Friend thinks that they should be reprimanded for this very un-British method of performing their duties?

Mr. Morrison: No, Sir, I am not aware of these things, nor are they admitted in the letter which the Under-Secretary wrote to the hon. Lady.

Mrs. Keir: Owing to the unsatisfactory nature of the reply, I beg to give notice that I shall raise the matter on the Adjournment.

Oral Answers to Questions — DETAINEES

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore: asked the Home Secretary how many British subjects, at present detained under Regulation 18B, it is proposed to retain in custody until the end of the war?

Mr. H. Morrison: The case of every such person is reviewed from time to time, and detention is continued only so long as I am satisfied that it is necessary for reasons of national security. I cannot say in advance in how many cases, or for how long, those reasons will continue to obtain.

Sir T. Moore: Would my right hon. Friend give special consideration to those who served our country with honour in the last war and also to those who are eager to serve it in this war? From the man-power aspect alone, the matter is important.

Mr. Morrison: That factor is taken into account, but my basic duty is to consider the safety of the country, and I will carry that duty out.

Commander Locker-Lampson: Will the right hon. Gentleman keep Sir Oswald Mosley under lock and key?

Oral Answers to Questions — LOCAL GOVERNMENT ELECTIONS

Mr. De la Bère: asked the Home Secretary whether, in view of the fact that Parliamentary by-elections are permitted during the war period, and that the war has extended for nearly four years, he will consider taking steps to amend the Local Elections and Registered Electors (Temporary Provisions) Act, 1939, which has been renewed each year, to permit of the holding of local government elections; and on what grounds, having regard to the duration of the war, the continued suspension of local elections is justified?

Mr. H. Morrison: As I stated when the Local Elections and Register of Electors (Temporary Provisions) Bill, 1942, was in Committee last October, the position will be considered when the time comes to prepare a further Bill next autumn, but hitherto Parliament has not taken the view


that the possibility of holding Parliamentary by-elections is a reason for holding local elections during the war, and there would be many difficulties in doing so. One of them is that the depleted and overburdened staffs of the many local authorities concerned would not be able to undertake the heavy additional work which would be involved.

Mr. De la Bère: Nevertheless, will my right hon. Friend bear in mind that the present method is undesirable and very undemocratic? Many of these people are co-opted, and the number of members co-opted is getting larger than the number elected. This matter wants reviewing.

Mr. Morrison: I appreciate the difficulties, but one of the reasons why British democracy survives is that in critical times it can adapt itself to the difficulties.

Mr. De la Bère: This is going on too long.

Mr. Thorne: When a Member passes away or resigns are not his constituents entitled to have a by-election?

Mr. Morrison: No, Sir, the vacancy is filled by co-option.

Mr. De la Bère: There is too much co-option.

Oral Answers to Questions — CIVIL DEFENCE

Refugees (Visas)

Commander Locker-Lampson: asked the Home Secretary whether the possibility of instituting a system of block visas for refugees has been considered by His Majesty's Government and will be tried sooner than lose any chance of saving persecuted Jews?

Mr. H. Morrison: A system of block visas would not be of any assistance in helping refugees to escape from enemy or enemy-occupied territory. As regards refugees who have already escaped to neutral territory, the difficulties are not due to the administrative arrangements for granting visas and would not be removed by an alteration of those arrangements. The question whether some representative should be authorised to distribute blocks of visas among applicants would only arise if it were first decided that there should be a policy of wholesale admissions

to this country during the war of fresh classes of alien refugees.

Miss Rathbone: Does the Home Secretary seriously maintain that if neutral countries know that blocks of visas are available for refugees to enter this country from enemy-occupied countries, that will not encourage them to admit more refugees?

Mr. Morrison: I cannot add to my answer.

Mr. Silverman: Are we to infer from the answer that, in spite of the declaration of 17th December, it is not my right hon. Friend's intention to admit any kind of refugee to this country who was not admissible under the Regulations of his Department as they existed before that date?

Mr. Morrison: As my hon. Friend knows, discussions are about to proceed on international action, and the Government are unable to alter their policy in advance of those discussions.

Colonel Cazalet: asked the Home Secretary whether, in view of the bad effect on the morale of men in alien companies of the Pioneer Corps and on other men and women doing valuable war service, of refusals to rescue their parents from danger by admitting them to this country, he will, pending a general revision of the present regulations for visas, relax these regulations to the extent of granting visas to parents in such cases where there is no individual reason to the contrary?

Mr. Morrison: I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the replies which I gave to the hon. Member for Cheltenham (Mr. Lipson) and the senior Member for the English Universities (Miss Rathbone) on 18th March, to which I have nothing to add.

Colonel Cazalet: Does that mean that the right hon. Gentleman is not prepared to consider any individual cases, however hard they may be?

Mr. Morrison: I am often considering individual cases, and many individuals have been permitted to come into this country.

Miss Rathbone: As the Home Secretary has said that we must wait for international action, is he aware that the


United States regulation visas long ago anticipated ours in this respect and that the reuniting of severed families is one of the principal objects of the United States regulations? Cannot we follow the example of the United States in this matter?

Mr. Morrison: I am not in a position to debate the regulations of the United States.

Colonel Cazalet: asked the Home Secretary whether the present regulation permitting the granting of visas to wives of men serving in the Forces or doing valuable war work for ourselves or the Allies will be extended to the husbands of women similarly occupied?

Mr. Morrison: If the circumstances of an alien woman in this country are analogous to those of an alien man whose wife is allowed to join him, I would certainly give sympathetic consideration to any application for the admission of such a woman's husband.

National Fire Service

Mr. Hutchinson: asked the Home Secretary whether there was any avoidable delay upon the part of the National Fire Service in ordering pumps and personnel to proceed to fires on a certain recent occasion to which his attention has been directed; whether the pumps and crews turned out promptly when the order was given; and whether he is able to make any statement upon the subject?

Mr. H. Morrison: I have received a full report on this incident. I understand that a few minutes' delay was caused through the call to the National Fire Service being received at a station which was not the nearest one to the fire, but that an appliance was on the spot within seven minutes of the call being received. Calls for assistance from the fire after the arrival of the first appliance were subjected to some delay owing to the local interruption of communications, but a second appliance appears to have arrived four minutes after the first, and a third appliance some eight minutes later. I cannot find any reason for thinking that the pumps and crews did not turn out promptly when the calls were received.

Mr. Hutchinson: May I ask my right hon. Friend whether he proposes to hold any investigation into this matter at

which persons who desire to do so may give evidence?

Mr. Morrison: When my hon. and learned Friend's Question was put down I caused inquiries to be made—I did so before, as a matter of fact. Considerable inquiries have been made, and this is the result. I hardly think that the question is one for a complicated inquiry with witnesses but if my hon. and learned Friend has any further evidence he would like to put to me, I will have it looked into.

Fire-Guard Duties

Mr. J. Henderson: asked the Home Secretary whether he will have inquiries made as to the circumstances in which Mr. Leonard Powell, employed as a carter at Ancoats Goods Station, Manchester, London Midland and Scottish Railway, has been excused fire-watching at his place of work?

Mr. H. Morrison: I am making inquiries in regard to this case, and will communicate with my hon. Friend as soon as possible.

Mr. Austin Hopkinson: Will the right hon. Gentleman also make inquiries into the case of the Liverpool dockers?

Mr. J. Henderson: Is the Home Secretary aware that the decision to exempt this man from fire-watching duties has not only added to the difficulties of the railway management but has met with very deep resentment from the members of the National Union of Railwaymen, who emphasise that all eligible employees should share the burden of fire-watching duty on terms of equality?

Mr. Morrison: I think that my hon. Friend will agree that, as I do not yet know the facts, it would be best for me not to express an opinion.

Mr. Hopkinson: Will the right hon. Gentleman do as I suggested and make inquiries as to whether the dockers in Liverpool have to serve as fire-watchers or not?

Mr. Morrison: I am always willing to inquire into anything connected with that great city.

Air-Raid Warnings

Mr. Thorne: asked the Home Secretary whether any local authority has the power to have any other method than the siren in the case of an air-raid?

Mr. H. Morrison: No, Sir. No public alarm other than the siren may be sounded without my specific authority; but certain towns on or near the South and East coasts which are liable to hit and run raids have been permitted to sound a local alarm signal publicly in addition to the national warning sounded on the siren.

Mr. Thorne: Has my right hon. Friend granted permission for a siren that sounds like a cuckoo?

Mr. Morrison: It is obviously most undesirable that I should answer questions about particular places in public.

Emergency Water Tank, St. Albans

Mr. Thorne: asked the Home Secretary whether he can give any information in connection with the emergency water tank built close to an air-raid shelter at St. Albans; who was responsible for placing the tank in this position; and what action he intends taking about the matter?

Mr. H. Morrison: As a result of representations recently made to me, this matter has been investigated, and it has been decided to halve the capacity of the tank by constructing a dividing wall and to use only that half of the tank farthest from the shelter. Other subsidiary precautionary measures will also be adopted and I am satisfied that the combined effect will be to prevent the possibility of water entering the shelter in the event of the fall of a bomb in the immediate vicinity. The siting of the tank was the subject of consultation between the Senior Regional Technical Adviser and the City Engineer.

Identity Cards

Mr. Cocks: asked the Home Secretary whether, in the new identity cards about to be issued, provision will be made for the insertion of such particulars as may be necessary to enable these cards to be used, if it should be decided so to use them, for purposes of electoral identification?

Mr. H. Morrison: Yes, Sir. This consideration has been kept well in mind.

Mr. Cocks: Will there be provided a space which could be stamped by the polling clerk to show that the card had been used at an election?

Mr. Morrison: I doubt whether that would be practical, because I would not know how many elections would take place.

Sir T. Moore: asked the Minister of Health whether he proposes to enforce the attachment of a fingerprint of the holder to each of the new identity cards?

The Minister of Health (Mr. Ernest Brown): I know of no considerations which modify the conclusions previously reached that neither a photograph nor finger prints upon identity cards could be relied upon unless authenticated by a responsible declarant having personal knowledge of the holder. My hon. and gallant Friend will appreciate the difficulty of insisting upon this condition in the reissue of cards to some 36,000,000 persons. Apart from this chief consideration, finger prints would be of little use on the occasions when identity cards are produced for inspection by the police or by members of the Armed Forces.

Sir T. Moore: Is the right hon. Gentleman satisfied that he has taken adequate precautions to prevent the new cards being forged, as the present ones are?

Mr. Brown: Yes, Sir.

Mr. Astor: Is it not a fact that in every area where the British Army are responsible for security they insist on having photographs on identity cards?

Sir H. Williams: How long would it take photographers to take 46,000,000 photographs?

Mr. Brown: The hon. Member knows of the long answer given by my predecessor, to which I have nothing to add.

Oral Answers to Questions — MOTOR VEHICLES, METROPOLITAN AREA (SPEED CONTROLS)

Captain Sir William Brass: asked the Home Secretary what considerations are taken into account by the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police in the selection of certain 220 yards stretches of road on which to operate traps by timing vehicles by stop-watch in war-time; and whether he will see that in future such roads are selected because accidents due to a speed over 30 miles per hour have occurred upon them in the recent past?

Mr. H. Morrison: Speed controls in the Metropolitan Police District are operated


on roads where it is apparent that speed limits are being habitually exceeded, and in selecting a stretch of road for the purpose account is taken of various features such as cross and converging roads, pedestrian crossing places, bus and tram stops, refuges, schools, and so forth. The suggestion in the second part of the Question that the police should not take preventive measures until after an accident has occurred is not one which I could accept.

Sir W. Brass: Is my right hon. Friend aware that the real reason why certain stretches of road are selected is because they are open stretches, perfectly safe on which to exceed 30 miles an hour, and in order to obtain a large number of convictions; and will he come with me to some of these roads and let me show him what they are like, and then he can judge for himself?

Mr. Morrison: With great respect, I do not wish to go with the hon. and gallant Gentleman. His argument is based on the assumption that it is not the duty of the police to enforce the law. I am awfully sorry, but it is the duty of the police to enforce the law, whether the law is right or wrong.

Mr. Leach: Is the Home Secretary aware that this Question has been put to him by an unrepentent sinner?

Viscountess Astor: Has the hon. Member any right to call another hon. Member a sinner?

Sir W. Brass: asked the Home Secretary how many drivers, timed by plain-clothes officers with stop-watches over stretches of 220 yards in the Metropolitan police area, during the last six months of 1942, have been proceeded against for dangerous or reckless driving in addition to, or in substitution for, the technical offence of exceeding 30 miles per hour in a built-up area?

Mr. Morrison: I regret that the particulars for which my hon. and gallant Friend asks are not available.

Sir W. Brass: Is it not a fact that no one has been prosecuted except for exceeding the limit of these traps, which illustrates the point I made in the previous Question I asked?

Mr. Morrison: I am sorry. As the facts are not available, I am unable to answer the hon. and gallant Member.

Sir W. Brass: If the police on the roads can waste their time doing this, surely they could look up a few figures?

Mr. Morrison: The police do catch an offender now and again, as my hon. and gallant Friend knows.

Sir W. Brass: asked the Home Secretary whether, in view of the acute shortage of male labour in the London area, he will instruct the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police area that the large number of officers ordinarily allocated to setting police traps in that area should be found work more closely connected with the war effort?

Mr. Morrison: No, Sir. The law imposes speed limits, and it is the duty of the police to enforce the law. Road accidents, apart from the suffering entailed, involve a serious loss of man-power and it is therefore of importance to the national effort to prevent them.

Sir W. Brass: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that there is an acute shortage of labour in the London area, as the right hon. Gentleman the Minister of Labour told me a few days ago, and could he not use the police for that purpose; and also that this sort of trapping is only done in the Metropolitan area and not in any other part of the whole of this country?

Mr. Morrison: I am, of course, aware of the shortage of labour in the London area, and I have released as many policemen as I can. I do not think I can release any more, otherwise we shall never catch anybody who does anything wrong.

Oral Answers to Questions — DOG TRACKS (TOTALISATOR RECEIPTS)

Mr. Thorne: asked the Home Secretary the total receipts for the 70 greyhound racing tracks for 1938 to 1941; the returns that are available for 1942; the receipts on the three tracks in Birmingham for 1942; the latest return for Rother-ham; and what the Rotherham returns showed in 1939?

Mr. H. Morrison: I assume that my hon. Friend is referring to receipts from totalisators on dog tracks. As I have explained


in answer to previous Questions, these figures are not available in my Department, and I regret that the labour involved in collecting them would not be justified.

Mr. Thorne: Is my right hon. Friend aware that figures have already been printed, and I will send him the list so that he can keep it in front of him?

Mr. Morrison: I shall be very grateful if my hon. Friend can supply me with the figures with which his Question has asked me to supply him.

Oral Answers to Questions — TRUCK ACTS (VOLUNTARY WAGE DEDUCTIONS)

Mr. Owen Evans: asked the Home Secretary whether he will consider introducing amending legislation, or a Regulation under the Defence Regulations, to regularise the position of employers who, with the consent of their employees, make deductions from wages in respect of the provision of accommodation in the nature of lodging, or in respect of contributions to the Red Cross Penny-a-Week fund and similar charities, as the former practice is, and the latter may be held to be, contrary to the requirements of the Truck Acts?

Mr. H. Morrison: I recognise the force of the considerations which my hon. Friend has in mind, but any amendment of the Truck Acts is by no means a simple or easy project; and I am anxious to avoid at the present time the large expenditure of time and labour which would be required in framing a satisfactory scheme for the modernisation of their provisions.

Mr. Evans: The right hon. Gentleman did not answer that part of my Question suggesting it might be done by some form of regulation, and would he consider this method very carefully, owing to the widespread feeling which has grown up in the country that this can be done by agreement between the employers and trade union representatives, as it is all done to help the war effort; and will he consider the possibility of regularising the position not by legislation but by some form of regulation?

Mr. Morrison: If it were so restricted, it is conceivable, I agree, that it might be done by Defence Regulation, and I will consider my hon. Friend's points. I

assure him that this Truck Acts issue bristles with difficulties and controversy, and I am a little nervous about going into it.

Oral Answers to Questions — POLICE WIDOWS' PENSIONS

Mr. Kendall: asked the Home Secretary whether the Police Federation now accept the principles for increased pensions for widows of police officers suggested by the Snell Committee; what is the position as regards increased pensions for existing police widows in that event; and if the Police Federation have not accepted the principles suggested by the Snell Committee, will he reconsider the decision contained in his reply of the 22nd October, 1942, with a view to compelling acceptance of the recommendations of the Snell Committee?

Mr. H. Morrison: I am not aware that the Police Federation have modified their views on the Report of the Snell Committee. The second part of the Question does not therefore arise. As regards the last part of the Question, the absence of agreement on the fundamental question of the incidence of cost of the proposed increases makes it impossible in my view to contemplate the introduction of legislation.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRISONERS (TIME FOR EXERCISE)

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Home Secretary whether improved arrangements have now been instituted in prisons to enable prisoners to spend more time out of cells; and what are the hours per day now spent in cells?

Mr. Morrison: Yes, Sir. Arrangements have recently been made for an increase in the hours of duty of prison officers which will enable prisoners to be out of their cells each day for one hour longer than hitherto. As a result, prisoners will now be out of their cells for employment and exercise for about seven hours 20 minutes from Monday to Friday, three hours on Saturday, and 3½ hours on Sunday for chapel and exercise. These periods are substantially increased in the cases of those prisoners who attend physical training classes and educational classes.

Mr. Sorensen: Is my right hon. Friend aware that his announcement will cause


great satisfaction and will undoubtedly produce a beneficial effect on prisoners?

Mr. Morrison: I am much obliged to my hon. Friend.

Oral Answers to Questions — Mr. D. F. SPRINGHALL (JOURNEY TO RUSSIA)

Mr. Ridley: asked the Home Secretary whether he can say on what dates, round about the beginning of the war, Mr. D. F. Springhall left and returned to this country?

Mr. H. Morrison: My information is that Mr. Springhall left London on 19th August, 1939, on a boat sailing for Leningrad, and arrived back on 24th September, 1939.

Mr. Ridley: Can my right hon. Friend say what was the declared purpose of the business of Mr. Springhall?

Mr. Morrison: So far as I know, there was no declared purpose, and, of course, it was a pre-war journey under the ordinary passport arrangements.

Oral Answers to Questions — EDUCATION (HISTORY BOOKS)

Sir T. Moore: asked the President of the Board of Education whether he will ask the Governments of the United States of America and Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to nominate members to Professor Barker's Committee now set up to consider the publication of objective history books of all countries for the post-war years?

The President of the Board of Education (Mr. Butler): I have been asked as chairman of this Conference of Representatives of the Allied Governments established in the United Kingdom and of the French National Committee, whom I invited to meet me to consider the needs of enemy-occupied countries, to inform the Representatives of the Governments of the U.S.A. or of the U.S.S.R. of our activities. I hope to secure their interest and co-operation.

Sir T. Moore: My right hon. Friend has not answered my Question. I asked him whether he had approached, or would approach, the United States and the Soviet Governments with a view to sending representatives to serve on Professor Barker's Committee, especially in view of

the fact that the modern history books of both these great countries have partly led to the misunderstandings now, happily, being cleared up.

Mr. Butler: I answered the Question specifically by saying that I hope to enlist their co-operation.

Mr. Woodburn: Would the right hon. Gentleman consider getting this Committee to examine our own history books, some of which are terrible?

Mr. Butler: We do that in other ways, within our own administration.

Oral Answers to Questions — PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS (AGED PEOPLE)

Mr. Hewlett: asked the Minister of Health whether he will recommend to local authorities managing institutions for the final care of the aged, the introduction into dormitories of some measure of cubicle privacy, in view of the present absence thereof and the objection of the aged to communal living?

Mr. E. Brown: I am in full sympathy with the objects of the Question, but in view of the shortage of labour and materials of all kinds, I should not feel justified at the present time in making any general recommendation to local authorities on the subject.

Viscountess Astor: Will my right hon. Friend see what we are doing at Plymouth?

Mr. Brown: I am aware of that.

Oral Answers to Questions — PUBLIC HEALTH

Milk (Pasteurisation)

Dr. Russell Thomas: asked the Minister of Health what standard of cleanliness is required in pasteurised milk?

Mr. E. Brown: Standards of cleanliness for pasteurised milks are prescribed in the Milk (Special Designations) Order, 1936. "Pasteurised" milk must contain not more than 100,000 bacteria per millilitre and "Tuberculin Tested Milk (Pasteurised)" not more than 30,000 bacteria per millilitre at any time after pasteurisation and before delivery to the consumer.

Dr. Thomas: Is my right hon. Friend sure that he is alive to the danger of pasteurisation


as at present carried out covering up foul and filthy milk by falsely engendering the idea of safety behind this process? Is he aware too of a recent case, published by a reputable journal, in which a labourer's boot covered with dry manure was found in a receptacle containing this milk?

Mr. Brown: That does not arise out of this Question.

Mrs. Tate: Why is "T.T." milk ever pasteurised? Is not such an action quite inexcusable?

Sir Herbert Williams: What number of germs are there in one-thousandth part of a quart?

Dr. Thomas: Sometimes as many as 3,000,000.

Sir H. Williams: Then is not the population rather dense?

Typhus Squads (Compensation)

Sir P. Hurd: asked the Minister of Health whether his attention has been drawn to the public-spirited action of men in Norfolk Rural District Council areas who have volunteered for work in typhus squads in case outbreaks should occur; and whether he will take steps now to assure them of compensation for personal injury on the terms that apply generally to Civil Defence volunteers?

Mr. E. Brown: Yes, Sir. It does not appear that the statutory provisions of the Personal Injuries Scheme as applicable to Civil Defence volunteers could be applied, as they stand, to the persons to whom my hon. Friend refers; but I am considering the matter further and will confer about it with my right hon. Friend the Minister of Pensions.

Artificial Limbs (Children)

Major Sir Jocelyn Lucas: asked the Minister of Health whether he can yet make any statement as to the advice to be issued to the maternity and child welfare authorities with regard to the provision of artificial limbs for children in need of them; and whether he will lay down that no child who loses a limb shall be deprived of the right to an artificial one by reason of the inability of the parents to purchase one should it be recommended by the medical authorities?

Mr. E. Brown: A circular, to be issued jointly by my right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Education and myself, is now being printed and will I hope be issued before the middle of the month. I will send my hon. Friend a copy. I have no power to require welfare authorities to supply artificial limbs but the circular will give approval to the exercise of their powers for this purpose.

Diphtheria Immunisation (Cost)

Mr. Leach: asked the Minister of Health the amount of the expenditure incurred by his Department in the advertisement and carrying out of the policy of immunisation against diphtheria during the last financial year for which the figures are available; and the estimated amount of such expenditure for the current year?

Mr. E. Brown: The cost to the Exchequer of publicity advocating the immunisation of children against diphtheria was £2,276 in 1941–42, and £19,909 in 1942–43. The cost of carrying out immunisation falls on the local authorities except as regards the toxoid, which the Government supply to the authorities free of charge. The cost to the Exchequer of the toxoid was £14,638 in 1941–42 and is estimated at about £17,000 in the year ended 31st March, 1943.

Mr. Leach: Does the right hon. Gentleman not agree that, in view of the fact that the benefits up to now have been quite nil, the expense should now be terminated?

Mr. Brown: I disagree totally with that.

Sir Francis Fremantle: Does the right hon. Gentleman recognise that this is a very cheap price to pay for the very large number of lives that have been saved?

Venereal Disease (Treatment Fees)

Mr. Parker: asked the Minister of Health whether he is aware that fees are charged for treatment of venereal diseases at many hospitals and clinics; and whether this can be abolished so as to remove this deterrent to improving the nation's health?

Mr. E. Brown: No, Sir. It has been made clear to local authorities that treatment of venereal disease at approved centres under their control is to be free. If my hon. Friend can send me particulars of any case where fees are being


charged at such a centre, I will look into it. I have no jurisdiction, of course, as regards treatment not connected with the public health service of local authorities.

Viscountess Astor: Is it not a fact that a great many people think that unless they pay for treatment it is not good?

Hospital Nurses (Welfare)

Mr. Sorensen: asked the Minister of Health whether, in view of the longer hours worked and the strenuous service rendered by hospital nurses, he will recommend to local authorities that particular consideration should be given to the need of providing an adequate and nourishing diet for nurses and an arrangement for hours of duty and holidays for probationer nurses who have to sit for examinations, so that undue strain is not imposed upon them?

Mr. E. Brown: I have no reason to suppose that the importance of an adequate and nourishing diet is not fully appreciated by local authorities and other hospital authorities; but I will look into any particular instances which my hon. Friend may bring to my notice. As regards hours of work and length of holidays for student nurses, I would draw my hon. Friend's attention to paragraphs 50 and 52 of the First Report of the Rushcliffe Committee, which has been generally commended to all hospital authorities.

Mr. Sorensen: Would it not be useful to circularise local authorities, in view of the fact that some nurses are undoubtedly feeling the increasing strain?

Mr. Brown: I do not think there is any need for that, because the authorities are represented on the Committee.

Sir Stanley Reed: Will the right hon. Gentleman take steps to raise the standard of cooking?

Mr. Brown: I should like to see an improvement in cooking everywhere.

Mr. Holdsworth: Is the old rule still in existence by which Members are responsible for facts stated or implied in Questions? If it is implied that conditions are unsatisfactory, ought not Members to get to know that the facts are correct before putting such a Question on the Paper?

Mr. Speaker: I think the hon. Member is asking if Members are responsible for

the facts stated in their Questions. Yes, every Member is responsible.

Miss Rathbone: May I ask you, Sir, to elucidate that further, because what is the point of asking a Question if you are certain of the reply?

Mr. Speaker: When one asks a Question, one does not state facts. One states the circumstances from which the Question arises, and one is responsible for ensuring that these are as reasonably accurate as is possible before putting a Question on the Order Paper.

Mr. Sorensen: May I take it that my Question was quite in Order?

Sir H. Williams: If the facts stated by the Member are wrong and he is responsible, what is the sanction?

Oral Answers to Questions — HOUSING

Agricultural Workers' Cottages

Brigadier-General Clifton Brown: asked the Minister of Health what steps he is taking to see that the 3,000 cottages he is allowing local authorities to build for agricultural labourers are used for that purpose only, now and in the future; and what is his definition of "agricultural labourer" for that purpose?

Mr. E. Brown: These cottages will be subject to the requirements of Section 2 (2) of the Housing (Financial Provisions) Act, 1938, which provides that the local authority shall secure that a number of houses equal to the number in respect of which the agricultural subsidy is being paid are reserved for members of the agricultural population, except in so far as the demand for housing accommodation on the part of members of the agricultural population can be satisfied without such reservation. Agricultural population is defined in Section 115 (2) of the Housing Act, 1936, as meaning "persons whose employment or latest employment is or was employment in agriculture or in an industry mainly dependent on agriculture and includes also the dependants of such persons." Agriculture is defined in the same Section as including dairy farming, poultry farming, the use of land as grazing, meadow or pasture land or orchard or osier land or woodland or for market gardens or nursery grounds.

Brigadier-General Brown: Is the Minister aware that when an agricultural


labourer leaves his cottage it usually gets into the hands of the local authority, which puts one of its own roadmen or other employees into it?

Mr. Brown: I would not say it has not happened, but I would not accept that as a generalisation.

Viscountess Astor: It very often does happen.

Mr. De la Bère: The Noble Lady is quite right.

Durham County

Mr. W. Joseph Stewart: asked the Minister of Health the number of two, three and four-apartment houses in the administrative county of Durham and the county boroughs of Sunderland and South Shields, respectively?

Mr. E. Brown: As the reply involves a tabular statement I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following is the statement:


—
Number of occupied dwellings consisting of


1–3 rooms.
4–5 rooms.
Total sizes.


Administrative County of Durham
88,526
99,302
206,403


Sunderland County Borough
9,450
13,522
31,970


South Shields County Borough
13,121
9,393
25,527

Planning (Density)

Mr. Bossom: asked the Minister of Health the regulations controlling the density of houses permitted to the acre in both rural and urban districts?

Mr. E. Brown: As my hon. Friend was informed by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Town and Country Planning in a recent reply, there are no such regulations.

Mr. Bossom: Will my right hon. Friend give some guidance in this matter, because it is rather important in the laying-out of houses in future?

Mr. Brown: I shall keep in close touch with the Minister of Town and Country Planning on this subject. There was a provision in the Act of 1924, but that was repealed by the Act of 1933.

Oral Answers to Questions — LOCAL AUTHORITIES (FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE)

Mr. Doland: asked the Minister of Health whether it is the policy of the Government to obtain full repayment from those local authorities who have received financial assistance in order that essential services may be maintained; and when will these authorities be expected to repay such sums?

Mr. E. Brown: The policy of the Government in this matter was fully set out in my reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Sir J. Mellor) on 24th June, 1941. Seventy-five per cent. of the necessary assistance is by way of grant, the remaining 25 per cent. being an advance free of interest. Ultimate liability for repayment of the latter will be a matter for discussion after the war with each local authority concerned in the light of the circumstances, both national and local, then prevailing.

Sir Adam Maitland: Is the Minister aware that the policy of the Government in this matter is very much resented by local authorities generally?

Mr. Brown: I am not aware of that.

Sir A. Maitland: But has not the Minister had certain representations about it?

Mr. Brown: I have had representations on certain points, but there was no general disagreement.

Oral Answers to Questions — NATIONAL REGISTRATION

Major Lyons: asked the Minister of Health whether he can make any statement on the matter of a fresh national registration of the people?

Mr. E. Brown: If my hon. and gallant Friend has in mind a fresh enumeration to obtain fresh returns from every member of the people on the lines of the initial compilation of the National Register in 1939, no such proposal is contemplated. Apart from the heavy man-power burden involved, it is not seen that it would have any advantages.

Major Lyons: Does it not mean that the proposal that new cards should be issued in place of the present cards will preserve the anomalies now existing and permit the fraud and evasion which occur


so often and which are not always brought before the courts?

Mr. Brown: The cards will be issued in the light of the experience which has been gained.

Major Lyons: Will they be issued, in the light of experience gained, to the same people on the same terms, because, if so, the inaccuracies will be perpetuated?

Mr. De la Bère: How much light is there?

Oral Answers to Questions — POST-WAR RECONSTRUCTION, NORTHERN IRELAND

Dr. Little: asked the Prime Minister whether Northern Ireland, as a part of the United Kingdom, will be embraced in the four-year post-war plan which he has outlined to the nation and receive its full share of all the advantages accruing there-from?

The Deputy Prime Minister (Mr. Attlee): Post-war reconstruction in Northern Ireland is mainly a matter for the Northern Ireland Government, but His Majesty's Government will take them into the fullest consultation, and it is hoped that the close collaboration we enjoy at present on all matters will continue after the war.

Oral Answers to Questions — EQUAL COMPENSATION (COMMITTEE'S REPORT)

Mrs. Tate: asked the Prime Minister what policy has been decided upon for compensation of war injured civilians after consideration of the Report of the Select Committee on Equal Compensation?

Mr. Attlee: His Majesty's Government's decisions in this matter will be announced in a statement to be made before Easter.

Oral Answers to Questions — CIVIL AVIATION

Mr. Granville: asked the Minister without Portfolio whether he is in a position to make a statement on the discussions with the Dominions on the future of civil aviation as it affects the British Commonwealth of Nations?

The Minister without Portfolio (Sir William Jowitt): No, Sir; except that

the discussions are proceeding satisfactorily.

Mr. Granville: Can the right hon. and learned Gentleman give an assurance that the Dominions will be fully consulted on air lines and the production of air liners? Would it not be better to set up a Commonwealth Development Board instead of having occasional consultations?

Sir W. Jowitt: Certainly the Dominions will be fully consulted

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE

Water Supplies (Cattle)

Sir Reginald Clarry: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether, in view of the importance of ensuring that a supply of clean uninfected water is made available to cattle, he will consider extending the assistance at present given to farmers to local authorities in rural districts so as to enable them, if necessary, to put in hand water schemes which cannot be financed out of rates or revenue?

The Minister of Agriculture (Mr. R. S. Hudson): I cannot undertake to introduce legislation extending grant-aid by my Department to local authorities who are water undertakers to put in hand new schemes of water supply. The grants made at present to farmers in aid of capital expenditure incurred by them in obtaining a supply are available whether or not the water is obtained from a local authority.

Diseased Cattle (Removal)

Sir R. Clarry: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he will take steps to ensure that the Order prohibiting the removal of cattle infected with tuberculosis in a clinical form from farm premises to an open market is rigidly enforced; and whether he will extend this Order to include cattle suffering from contagious abortion?

Mr. Hudson: All practical steps are taken to ensure that cattle infected with tuberculosis in a clinical form are not removed from farm premises to a market. With regard to the latter part of the Question, the exposure in a market of a cow which has calved prematurely within the preceding two months is prohibited by the Epizootic Abortion Order of 1922.

Returns and Forma

Mr. De la Bère: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he can how give consideration to the reduction of the number of returns and forms which are issued for completion to both farmers and farm-workers, with a view to assisting them and to enable them to devote the maximum amount of time to the production of food?

Mr. Hudson: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given by my right hon. Friend the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the hon. Member for East Middlesbrough (Mr. A. Edwards) on 12th February, 1942.

Mr. De la Bère: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware of the urgent need for more common sense in this matter, and further, is he not aware that common sense is the rarest sense and is not always available at the Ministry of Agriculture?

Mr. Hudson: I am afraid it is because a large number of people do not exercise common sense that we have to use so many forms.

Foot and Mouth Disease Order, 1928 (Orkney)

Major Neven-Spence: asked the Minister of Agriculture (1) why he refused to confirm a regulation made by the county council of Orkney on 5th January, 1943, under Section 22 (1, a) of the Foot and Mouth Disease Order, 1928;
(2) whether it is his policy to refuse to confirm all regulations made by local authorities under Section 22 (1, a) of the Foot and Mouth Disease Order, 1928;
(3) whether he is aware that his decision not to confirm the regulation made by the county council of Orkney under Section 22 (1, a) of the Foot and Mouth Disease Order, 1928, which was sent to him by express letter on 5th January, did not reach the county council until 23rd January, and will he explain the delay?.

Mr. Hudson: I refused to confirm the Regulation in question because I was satisfied that the control measures exercised by my Department were adequate to meet the situation and that in the circumstances the additional restrictions proposed by the Orkney County Council constituted an unnecessary interference with movements of stock. My refusal to confirm this Regulation was based on the merits of the particular case. In different circumstances my decision might well be

otherwise. The delay in communicating my decision was more apparent than real. In the 11 days which elapsed between the receipt of the letter from the Council and the despatch of my final decision, verbal communications took place between representatives of the Council and officers of my Department.

Part-Time Workers (Industrial Firms)

Sir P. Hurd: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether his attention has been drawn to the arrangements made by some industrial firms to adopt farms in their vicinity so as to supply teams of part-time workers to help in the growing and harvesting of crops during the summer; and whether he will approach other suitable firms to induce them to give similar aid to food production in other parts of the country?

Mr. Hudson: Yes, Sir. Arrangements on these lines are being made in a number of counties and should prove extremely valuable. I have suggested to all county war agricultural executive committees that they should approach local firms, either direct or through chambers of commerce, to ask for this kind of co-operation.

Prisoners of War

Sir A. Knox: asked the Minister of Agriculture whether he will issue a statement explaining the conditions laid down for the employment of prisoners of war in agriculture and the arrangements for their control and supervision?

Mr. Hudson: The conditions of employment vary according as the prisoners are living in on farms or employed from a hostel or from a central camp, and I am sending my hon. and gallant Friend copies of leaflets explaining these conditions which are issued to farmers who employ prisoners. As regards the second part of the Question, working parties of 12 or more prisoners are provided with an armed escort, who is responsible for their safe custody and also for checking any idleness and securing a proper output of work. Farmers employing unescorted prisoners are responsible for their safe custody. It is in all cases the responsibility of the employer to see that the work of the prisoners is properly organised and supervised.

Sir A. Knox: In the case of prisoners being let out to farmers, who sees that the Regulations are carried out?

Mr. Hudson: The farmer is responsible for the custody and supervision of the men employed on his farm, and the farm is visited regularly by an officer from the camp.

Mr. Hannah: Do the prisoners of war give good service as a whole?

Oral Answers to Questions — ORDNANCE SURVEY, WALES

Professor Gruffydd: asked the Minister of Agriculture, whether, on the Ordnance Survey which is now revising the maps of some parts of Wales, there is any person competent to deal with the Welsh names and what are his qualifications; and, if not, will he see that such a person is appointed?

Mr. Hudson: As the answer is somewhat long, I will with permission circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Following is the answer:

There is no officer with special Welsh qualifications on the Ordnance Survey staff engaged on the revision of Ordnance Survey maps of Wales. It is, however, the practice to consult the variousLocal Authorities and ascertain from them the name of each object and the locally accepted spelling. In the case of natural features the local version is checked against the glossary prepared some years ago with the aid of leading Welsh-speaking authorities and checked in 1939 by the University Board of Celtic Studies at Cardiff. When the local version is at variance with the glossary a reference is made to the Board of Celtic Studies who were good enough to offer their assistance to the Department in this matter in 1939.

Oral Answers to Questions — VITAL STATISTICS

Sir Francis Fremantle: asked the Minister of Health the birth-rate for England and Wales in 1941 and 1942, respectively?

Mr. E. Brown: The birth-rates for England and Wales in 1941 and 1942 were 14.2 and 15.8, respectively, per 1,000 population. The figure for 1942 is provisional.

Sir F. Fremantle: Does the right hon. Gentleman consider that this welcome improvement is a short-term, temporary

improvement or that it indicates any further improvement?

Mr. Brown: I prefer to wait and see.

Sir F. Fremantle: asked the Minister of Health the death rates for England and Wales in 1941 and 1942, respectively?

Mr. Brown: The death rates for England and Wales in 1941 and 1942 were 12.9 and 11.6, respectively, per 1,000 population. The figure for 1942 is provisional.

Sir F. Fremantle: Will the right hon. Gentleman be able in due course to give the standardised rates and comparative rates over a period recently, so that we can understand the bearing of these figures?

Mr. Brown: I will do my best to put them in a proper setting.

Sir F. Fremantle: asked the Minister of Health the rate of infant and maternal mortality for England and Wales in 1941 and 1942, respectively?

Mr. Brown: The infant and maternal mortality rates are the lowest ever recorded. As the full answer involves a tabular statement I will, with permission, circulate it in the OFFICIAL REPORT.

Sir F. Fremantle: Does this reply indicate that the right hon. Gentleman is feeling the value of maternity homes and the great need of further provision of these homes?

Mr. Brown: Not only that, but of all maternity and child welfare.

Following is the statement:



England and Wales.


1941.
1942 (provisional).


Infant deaths per 1,000 live births
59
49


Maternal deaths per 1,000 live and still births:




Post-abortive infection
0.35
0.35


Abortion without sepsis
0.19
0.11


Infection during childbirth and puerperium
0.47
0.42


Other maternal deaths
1.75
1.59

Oral Answers to Questions — AGED WORKERS (NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE)

Mr. Tinker: asked the Minister of Health (1) how many of the men and women over 65 and 60 years of age, who


have entered into industry since the war started, were not insured persons under the National Health Insurance;
(2) whether he is aware that a number of women over 60 years of age and a number of men over 65 years of age, who have not been insured under the National Health Insurance, have, owing to war emergency, entered industry and are debarred from having free medical attention; and will he examine the position to see whether something can be done to place them on the same footing as insured persons?

Mr. E. Brown: I regret that I am unable to furnish the hon. Member with the numbers of men over 65 and women over 60 who have entered industry since the war began and who were not previously insured under the National Health Insurance Acts. I am aware that these men and women are not entitled to medical benefit under those Acts, but, as I have already informed my hon. Friend in this House and in correspondence, it is not possible for such provision to be made within the present framework of the National Health Insurance scheme.

Mr. Tinker: Cannot some attempt be made to meet this difficulty, because these people are coming forward very well and should be given the same facilities as those who are insured?

Mr. Brown: I do not think we can do anything without an alteration of the whole structure.

Oral Answers to Questions — POST-WAR PLANNING (OPEN SPACES)

Mr. Bossom: asked the Minister of Town and Country Planning when he is going to give guidance to local authorities in many of the poorest and most congested areas where open spaces are most needed but where they are least able to meet problems of compensation as to what financial aid they may expect from the Government?

The Minister of Town and Country Planning (Mr. W. S. Morrison): On the question of financial assistance to local authorities, I would refer the hon. Member to what my right hon. and learned Friend the Minister without Portfolio said in his speech on 1st December, 1942, to which I am not yet in a position to add.

Mr. Bossom: Would my right hon. Friend make that information quite clear, as many local authorities are not informed as to their position in this matter?

Mr. Morrison: I think that most of them are.

Oral Answers to Questions — ARMED FORCES (PENSIONS AND GRANTS)

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Ian Fraser: asked the Minister of Pensions how many pensioners of the last war are receiving the full 100 per cent. disability pension; did his recent count which showed that 19 out of 20 of disabled men were employed full time earning good wages and doing good work for the nation cover the whole field or a sample; what was the number of 100 per cent. disabled men in the count; and how many of them were employed as described?

The Minister of Pensions (Sir Walter Womersley): Rather under 24,000 pensioners of the last war are drawing disability pensions at the 100 per cent. rate. The latest count made by the Ministry of Labour and National Service showed that some 4,000 disabled men of the last war were unemployed as compared with the present total of nearly 400,000 disability pensioners. In making the statement that 19 out of 20 disabled men were now employed I added to the Ministry of Labour and National Service figure of 4,000 a further 16,000 to allow for unemployed men who might not be registered with that Department. My estimate thus covered the whole body of disabled ex-service men. I can give no indication of the distribution either of the 4,000 or of the 16,000 over the various degrees of disablement.

Sir I. Fraser: In the light of what I may call my right hon. Friend's sympathetic hint in the recent Debate, will he receive representations from the British Legion and others with an open mind with a view to trying to do something for the men disabled in the severest degree who are living on the subsistence line?

Sir W. Womersley: Yes, Sir.

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

Mr. Arthur Greenwood: May I ask the Prime Minister whether he will state the Business for the next Sitting Days?

The Prime Minister (Mr. Churchill): The Business for the next series of Sittings will be as follows:
First Sitting Day—Assuming that we have concluded the Committee stage of the Catering Wages Bill, the Business will be: Committee and remaining stages of the Nurses Bill; Second Reading of the Evidence and Powers of Attorney Bill (Lords); Second Reading of the Courts (Emergency Powers) Bill (Lords); Committee and remaining stages of the Army and Air Force (Annual) Bill; and Motion to approve the China Clay (Charges) Order.
Second Sitting Day—It is proposed to move Mr. Speaker out of the Chair on going into Committee of Supply on the Civil Estimates and Estimates for the Revenue Departments. The Amendment standing in the name of the hon. Member for Shettleston (Mr. McGovern) relating to the British Broadcasting Corporation will be considered.
Third Sitting Day—Supply (4th Allotted Day): Committee. Continuation of Debate on Colonial Administration in the West Indies.

Mr. Greenwood: May I ask the Prime Minister whether his attention has been drawn to a Motion which has been on the Order Paper some time and widely signed by Members of all parties with regard to the position of refugees, and whether it will be possible to arrange before the Easter Recess for a discussion of this problem?

[That, in view of the massacres and starvation of Jews and others in enemy and enemy-occupied countries, this House desires to assure His Majesty's Government of its fullest support for immediate measures, on the largest and most generous scale compatible with the requirements of military operations and security, for providing help and temporary asylum to persons in danger of massacre who are able to leave enemy and enemy-occupied countries.]

The Prime Minister: The Government are not at all opposed in principle to such a discussion, but we should like to consider what will be the most convenient moment when the discussion would do the maximum amount of good. I think that it would be better, if possible; to take place when the Foreign Secretary has returned, as he has been discussing these

matters in the United States and knows exactly what the latest position between the United Nations concerned is on the matter. Perhaps my right hon. Friend will explore the question through the usual channels.

Mr. Henderson Stewart: When is it proposed to take the Committee stage of the Hydro-Electric Development (Scotland) Bill?

The Prime Minister: Not until after Easter.

Mr. Stewart: As some delay in addition to that which has taken place seems inevitable, may I ask whether, in view of the extraordinarily large number of Amendments already handed in, covering 30 pages of the Order Paper, and of the fact that a considerable proportion of them are Government Amendments proposing legislation by reference to an extraordinary degree, the Government will consider cancelling the Committee stage, withdrawing the Bill, completely redrafting it, and presenting it in a more workmanlike form?

Mr. Kirkwood: Is that not a strange question to be put by an individual who is part and parcel of a group which has put down a large number of Amendments?

The Prime Minister: I am advised that the Government Amendments do not introduce any question of principle not covered by the Second Reading of the Bill on 24th February, Apart from the Schedules, the Government Amendments are largely of a drafting nature.

Mr. Buchanan: The Prime Minister said that the Business on the first Sitting Day depended on what happened to the Catering Bill. Am I to understand that if the Catering Bill is not finished, the other Business will be subject to adjustment? If that is so, is it not unfair to the House for the Business to be so uncertain?

The Prime Minister: If the Catering Wages Bill is not finished to-day, we shall have to go on with it on the first Sitting Day in the next series of Sittings, and then, no doubt, some of the other Business would have to be moved to a later date, but I hope it may be possible to come to a conclusion to-day on the Catering Bill.

Mr. R. J. Taylor: Are the Government yet in a position to say whether they can give an early date for a discussion of the Motion dealing with workmen's compensation standing in the name of a large number of hon. Members?

[This House is of opinion that the scales of payment to injured workmen under the Workmen's Compensation Act, 1925, deny a reasonable standard of living to the injured workman and his dependants and delays his restoration to full industrial employment, and calls upon the Government to take steps to raise the rates provided for in the 1925 Act by 50 per cent., and to adjust the method of calculating Pre-accident earnings so that the injured workmen may be compensated on an equitable basis.]

Mr. Ness Edwards: Will the Prime Minister have regard to the grave feeling of dissatisfaction which exists in the coalfields with regard to the present position, and will he endeavour to grant an early date for the discussion of workmen's compensation—after the time which has been occupied by the obstructionist tactics of the last few days?

The Prime Minister: I am afraid that I am not able to assign a date.

Mr. Buchanan: Is it quite fair for the Prime Minister to announce three days' Business subject to a set of conditions? Can he not give the House some better idea of what is likely to be the course of Business? If progress goes on at the same rate as yesterday, the Business programme announced for the next series of Sittings will be totally upset. Would it not have been better for him to have come to an arrangement with his own followers before announcing the forthcoming Business?

The Prime Minister: There are sometimes these vicissitudes in Parliamentary life and Parliamentary Business, and the House has in its Procedure and Rules of Order a certain amount of elasticity which I should be loth to curtail.

Mr. William Brown: I desire to ask the Prime Minister a question which I have asked once or twice before, and that is when are we likely to have an opportunity of discussing the Rushcliffe Committee's Report on the conditions of nurses? I ask that specifically because it appears that he is asking——

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member cannot go on to debate the subject.

Mr. Brown: I trust that I am not out of Order in asking for a discussion on the subject?

Mr. Speaker: The hon. Member can put a question, but he cannot start to debate it.

Mr. Brown: I will repeat my question. Many of us are wanting to discuss the subject, and are we likely to have an opportunity of discussing the Report of the Committee at an early date?

The Prime Minister: No. Sir, not at a very early date.

Sir Ralph Glyn: Has the attention of the Prime Minister been called to a Motion on the Order Paper, signed by a number of Members, asking that the Government should realise the anxiety of the House about the U-boat campaign and should take an opportunity of informing the House of great improvements which have recently been effected?

[That the operation of naval and air forces of the United Nations in the conduct of the anti-U-boat war should be examined by this House at an early date.]

The Prime Minister: I should deprecate a discussion upon this subject. Certainly it would be quite impossible in public, and even in Secret Session I should feel very much hampered in stating the full case. I must ask for a measure of confidence.

Mr. Stokes: Is the Prime Minister able to give us any indication as to when the Government will introduce a Measure empowering them to suspend the Standing Orders limiting the Sittings of the House for a definite period only, and will it be introduced at such a time as will allow of a full discussion of it?

The Prime Minister: At an early date this proposed alteration in the Standing Orders will be moved in the House and the usual opportunities of debate will be in no way limited.

Mr. James Griffiths: When may we expect a statement regarding the increase in old age pensions? It has been promised since last November, and I hope that it will be made before Easter.

The Prime Minister: The Bill is still being drafted, and the matter is to be disposed of before we separate this Session.

HOUSE OF COMMONS (STAFF)

Miss Ward: (by Private Notice)asked Mr. Speaker whether the Commissioners for the House of Commons Offices have considered the recommendation contained in paragraph 130 (4) of the Sixteenth Report from the Select Committee on National Expenditure, Session 1941–42, and whether they are prepared to extend this recommendation to the staff of the House of Commons Offices?

Mr. Speaker: The paragraph of the Report to which the hon. Member refers relates to a review of professional and technical staffs in Government Departments. The Report states that the review was carried out by assessors representing the professions concerned, such as engineers, chemists and land surveyors, and that their inquiry led the assessors to complain that there had been some cases of delay in approving promotions and increments of technical staffs. The Select Committee accordingly recommended that such delay should be eliminated. 
I fail to see what relation this recommendation bears to payments of the House of Commons staff, which are controlled by a Commission set up by Statute. The Commissioners have no evidence of any complaints by the House of Commons staff of delays in the payment of such increases of salary as have been awarded.
The Commissioners have a statutory duty to protect the interests of the servants of this House, and I venture the opinion that it is not in the best interests of the staff that their conditions of service should be dealt with by means of Question and answer in the House.

Miss Ward: Following upon the very excellent recommendation contained in the Select Committee's Report, and in view of the fact that it did refer only to certain classes of persons, may I ask you, Sir, whether you would reconsider the question of applying that very valuable recommendation to the officers of the staff on an appropriate occasion in the future?

Mr. Speaker: I can add nothing to the reply which I have just given:

MESSAGE FROM THE LORDS.

That they have agreed to,—

Agriculture (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill, with Amendments.

That they have passed a Bill, intituled "An Act to extend temporarily the powers of the Court under Section sixty-four of the Settled Land Act, 1925, and Section fifty-seven of the Trustee Act, 1925, and to amend the first-mentioned section as respects improvements."—[Settled Land and Trustee Acts (Court's General Powers) Bill [Lords].

AGRICULTURE (MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS) BILL

Lords Amendments to be considered upon the next Sitting Day, and to be printed. (Bill 21.).

SETTLED LAND AND TRUSTEE ACTS (COURTS GENERAL POWERS) BILL [Lords].

Read the First time; to be read a Second time upon the next Sitting Day. (Bill 22.)

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE

The Prime Minister (Mr. Churchill): I beg to move,
That the proceedings on the Catering Wages Bill be exempted at this day's Sitting from the provisions of the Standing Order (Sittings of the House).
I may say that we have no intention of asking the House to sit late, perhaps not more than an hour or so extra. We hope that the Bill may be disposed of, and I think it would be a great advantage if events took that course. A very full, discussion has taken place——

Sir Herbert Williams: On a point of Order. Is this Motion for the suspension of the Rule debatable?

Mr. Speaker: It is not debatable, but it is often customary to allow a short statement to be made in explanation.

The Prime Minister: I was only trying to smooth and mollify the proceedings as far as possible. As I have said, I hope that the proceedings on the Bill may be Wrought to a conclusion to-day. That would be of advantage to our Business in the next series of Sittings and meet the point which was raised earlier.

Question put, and agreed to.

Orders of the Day — CATERING WAGES BILL

Considered in Committee. [Progress 31st March.]

[Mr. CHARLES WILLIAMS in the Chair.]

Sir Douglas Hacking: Before we resume our proceedings on the Committee stage of this Bill, may I ask your permission to move to report Progress and ask leave to sit again, in order that I may be permitted to make a statement on the future of the Bill?

The Deputy-Chairman: I will accept that Motion.

Sir D. Hacking: I beg to move,
That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again
I desire to make a statement on the future attitude of myself and certain hon. Members who agree with me in the opposition which we have offered to this Measure. We have now spent two days on this Bill in Committee. For two days we have tried to reason with the Government. It has taken 12 hours to discuss four Clauses of the Bill—[HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"]—which means on an average three hours per Clause. I am asked why it has taken that length of time. It is because, as I have already said, we tried to reason with the Government. There are still 14 Clauses of the Bill and two Schedules to be discussed, and at this rate of progress, that means 48 hours more in Committee on the Bill, or nine normal Parliamentary days.
That, I think, shows the strength of the position of those who are in opposition to the Bill. But we do not desire, certainly those Members with whom I am associated do not desire, to take advantage of that strong position, because we realise that during those 12 hours, already spent on the Committee stage of the Bill, we have not received the slightest concession of any kind from the Government. In consequence, we are entitled to assume that we are not going to get any further consideration if we press the Amendments which still stand on the Order Paper in our names [Interruption]. That is our view. In those circumstances, we are not prepared to take up this immense amount of the time of the Committee. We realise


that there is much important legislation to go through the House of Commons. Personally, I have a great deal of sympathy with the Chief Whip. He promised to give another day for what he believed would be the conclusion of the Committee stage of the Bill, and for that I am grateful to him. I have much sympathy with him, because I know his difficulties, having myself served in the Whips' Office for two years. I recognise the assistance which he has given to us in our endeavour to get the Bill properly discussed, but we cannot discuss it properly and put all our arguments fully and fairly to the Government, without taking up a great deal of Parliamentary time. As I said, we have no desire to do that, particularly as we realise that we are not going to get the slightest concession from the Government. Therefore, I and certain hon. Members who are supporting me in this matter, have decided that we will not move any more of our Amendments in Committee, but they will remain on the Order Paper for the remainder of the day, and we would ask the Minister whether he will be good enough to examine them, in his spare time—and he will have more spare time now than he would have had if we had proceeded with our Amendments. We ask him to consider those Amendments, because they still form the basis of our opinion on this Measure.
There is just one thing I would like to add. Yesterday I think it was my Noble Friend the Member for Horsham (Earl Winterton) who suggested that I and some of my colleagues might go behind the Speaker's Chair and have a little discussion with the Minister of Labour or other Ministers taking part in the proceedings on this Measure. I do not think it is any breach of confidence to say that we have already tried that. Our meeting was not immediately behind the Speaker's Chair. It was some distance behind it—as far away as St. James's Square—but we got no satisfaction out of the Minister. We do ask him, however, to give sincere consideration to the Amendments which we have on the Order Paper; and if he cares to see us again in order to try to reach some compromise on the remaining Clauses of the Bill, we shall always be quite happy to see him. I conclude by saying that I hope this decision will meet with the approval of many hon. Members. Of course, I cannot bind every Member

of my committee and those with whom I have been working, but the decision which has been reached is, I think, generally acceptable to the great majority of my committee. We do not, therefore, intend to move on the Committee stage any of the Amendments which are on the Order Paper in our names. I thank you, Mr. Williams, for having given me this opportunity of announcing that decision.

The Minister of Labour (Mr. Ernest Bevin): I would not like the Committee to be under any misapprehension. It would be assumed from my right hon. Friend's statement that I had done nothing as a result of the meeting to which he referred, but, in fact, the bulk of the Amendments standing on the Order Paper in my name, or at least a good many of them, were the outcome of that discussion. I do not think my right hon. Friend will complain of the three hours which I spent with him and his friends at St. James's Square. I listened to them with great patience, of which happily I possess a large amount in dealing with business of this kind, and I thought, when I ended that meeting, that I had really met the legitimate objections to the Bill. No one was more surprised than those on the Government side who were present at that meeting to find on the Order Paper a complete reiteration of the whole of the Amendments as if those discussions had never taken place.
It is not fair, therefore, to suggest to the public and to this Committee that I did nothing at all. I tried to the best of my ability to meet what I thought were the legitimate points put up by the right hon. Gentleman and his friends, but, obviously, I could not agree to wreck the Bill or to make it unworkable. That would have been impossible. I have no objection to considering any case which is submitted to me. I have always been most conciliatory, though it may not be generally recognised, and I do not think, speaking personally, that I could have carried on the work which I have done all my life, unless I had understood negotiation and conciliation. I have really tried, in this case, to meet the objections advanced, and if the opponents of the Bill have any particular point which they would like to discuss with me outside, I have no objection at all to meeting them. I would not object to meeting anybody to discuss anything of that character if it facilitated the


work of the House of Commons. I welcome the suggestion of my right hon. Friend that the opponents of the Bill do not intend to move further Amendments, and I think that probably after examining the position, they have in their heart of hearts a recognition that I have tried to meet them in every way possible and a recognition, also, that the Bill is not so bad after all.

Commander Bower: I rise to support the Motion moved by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking). I cannot help feeling that the Government and this Committee have got themselves into a difficulty over this Bill, largely because of the peculiar war-time conditions under which we are labouring, but I would like to point out that many of us who dislike this Bill—and I should be out of Order now in discussing the merits of the Bill—foresaw something of this kind. The Government maintained that the Measure was non-controversial. We did not take that view, and I think the strongest supporter of the Bill will agree that our opinion was right and that the Measure has turned out to be very controversial. Then again there is the fact that under war-time conditions——

The Deputy-Chairman: We have had both sides of the case put on the Question that we should report Progress, and on the future proceedings on the Bill. Of course, the Motion to report Progress can be very widely discussed, but perhaps I may venture, with respect, to suggest that it would be as well if we did not, at this stage, initiate the sort of discussion that might lead to a prolonged Debate on the merits of what has happened in the past. I make that suggestion in the hope that it will be found convenient and acceptable to the Committee.

Commander Bower: I will pass on to what I consider to be the most important aspect of this difficulty, the constitutional aspect, which is of the greatest importance to this House. I have searched with some assiduity in the last day or two through the records of similar Bills in the past, and I have been unable to find any Committee stage which has been treated quite in this way. I think that, in that, there is a danger, because—I do not want to labour the point but only to mention it in passing—yesterday certain suggestions

were made by hon. Members who have never seen a Committee stage—and they are a large number in this House—that there was something in the nature of un-parliamentary obstruction. That has not been the case, because it has been a very mild, very orderly and very well-reasoned Committee stage, in which Members of all parties have taken part. There are difficulties, of course, to which I need not refer, in dealing with a Measure of this sort on the Floor of the House of Commons, and all experienced Members will realise it, even if less experienced ones do not.
There is a likelihood that, with the progress of the war, we have got ourselves into a sort of war-time attitude of mind. There may be other Measures of a controversial nature coming forward, and I go so far as to hope that there will be. I suggest to the Government that some steps must be taken to prevent this kind of thing happening again. We cannot have Measures passed through in this way. I support my right hon. Friend opposite in his view that we are not to get any concessions from the Minister. I am bound to say, with reference to what the Minister has just said, that it only shows what different impressions people can get of a meeting. We all came away from the meeting with him in St. James's Square with the confirmed impression that we were to get nothing but concessions of a minor nature. I would like to put this to Members of the Committee on all sides, that the Committee stage of any Bill is much the most important stage. It has always been the practice on Committee stages in the past, once a Bill has received its Second Reading, that Members of all parties try to knock the knobs off and smooth out the roughnesses of a Bill and get it into order. That is what we ought to try to do in this case, and I am a little disappointed that Members of some other parties have not tried to do so. I cannot help feeling that there is developing in this House a slightly totalitarian outlook. The Committee stage of a Bill is that on which we ought all to get together. With those words, I resume my seat.

Sir Herbert Williams: I was prevented from taking any part in the proceedings yesterday owing to a constituency engagement. I am frankly amazed at the statement which has just


been made by the right hon. Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking). The way to get Amendments out of a Minister is to make his life a bit of a misery, when, wearying of life on that basis, he comes to you and says: "What do you lads really want?" and then you do a deal. That is the way this place is run. We all know it, and it is no use blinding our eyes to it. When a Bill has been violently opposed there are Members sitting on the Government side of the Committee now who, when they were on this side, carried on for hours into the small hours of the morning moving Motions to report Progress, when they could get the Chair to accept them, forcing the Closure and forcing Divisions. That is the normal Parliamentary procedure, but there are about 150 Members in this place now who do not know how to run it. This Catering Bill was the beginning of their education. They were just beginning to approach the matriculation stage, and the right hon. Member for Chorley is depriving them of the only chance of Parliamentary education they have had in the past 3½ years.

Sir Percy Harris: I am very much in favour of this Bill, and I voted for the Second Reading. I agree with the hon. and gallant Member for Cleveland (Commander Bower) that we must keep up the right procedure of this House. It is our duty to examine a Bill and the reasons for it. It is recognised that these are war-time conditions, but we ought not to abandon our duty to move Amendments and try to improve a Bill. I am convinced that in another year or two we shall be faced with very important legislation, and I hope that some of it will be controversial. If it is to be constructive, there is bound to be a difference of opinion. I hope that the right hon. Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking) will not suggest that because it is war-time we are to abandon our responsibility for examining Bills on the Committee stage, when Amendments are put forward in a right spirit and not in a spirit of mischief-making or obstruction. That is one of our principal responsibilities as Members of Parliament.

Major Gluckstein: I am one of those who placed their names to a number of Amendments in an attempt to improve what is in my opinion a bad

Bill introducing a number of undesirable precedents. I do not desire to take the course which has been indicated by my right hon. Friend without explaining to the Committee that in doing so I am intending no discourtesy. I take this step from the profound conviction that the Minister, in spite of what he has just said, has not the slightest intention of making any concession to us who have tabled what I think are very reasonable Amendments.

Mr. Mathers: Will the hon. and gallant Gentleman allow me to interrupt? Is it not right that I should make it clear that not one of the Amendments brought forward by him and his friends and discussed was negatived by force? In many cases the promoters of them withdrew the Amendments, beaten by argument.

The Deputy-Chairman: We cannot discuss whether Amendments were or were not withdrawn because they were beaten by argument or for any other reason of that kind.

Mr. Mathers: I am asking the hon. and gallant Member to recognise that fact.

The Deputy-Chairman: That is not a point of Order.

Mr. Mathers: I was not raising a point of Order.

Major Gluckstein: Perhaps the hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Mathers) will make his speech later on. In my opinion, the Minister has adopted that course because he believes profoundly in the principle of the Bill under discussion. After all, those principles tally with his political philosophy. In my submission it would not be right in me to take the course I am proposing to take without making this explanation, but that does not excuse those hon. Members who belong to the same party as I do who might have been expected to insist upon some measure of protection being accorded to what is known, in a phrase, as the freedom of private enterprise. I think the Minister altered——

Mr. Buchanan: On a point of Order. Are we entitled, on a Motion to report Progress, to debate the merits of this Measure? Is not the hon. and gallant Gentleman now debating the merits and the rights and wrongs of Government action on the Bill?

The Deputy-Chairman: It can only be in Order to discuss the actual matter of reporting Progress, and that is why, if hon. Members get into a kind of battledore and shuttlecock about the reasons for supporting the Bill, hon. Members who did so would be out of Order.

Major Gluckstein: I will do my best to keep within your Ruling, Mr. Williams. I was saying that the Minister of Labour may well exclaim, "The War Cabinet is my washpot; over the Leader of the House will I cast out my shoe," because in the circumstances it seems to me a waste of valuable Parliamentary time to continue to press for the Amendments which stand in my name and in the names of my hon. Friends. It is also, in my opinion, a course which is likely to be injurious to the reputation of this House in this most serious moment of an extremely serious war. I was rather conscious yesterday, and could not help contrasting, the somewhat apathetic Committee stage which we had with the rather fiercer struggle being waged in North Africa, in which a number of my friends and constituents are taking part, and regarding which, from my personal experience, I have some idea of what they must be enduring. I therefore say that I am far more interested in eliminating the Tunis tip than the waiters' tip, and I think it will be helpful to the Minister if those of us who are opposing this Measure in its Committee stage give him and his staff an opportunity of getting back to their much more important war duties, and we leave him to take such steps as he thinks right to deal with this Bill.

Sir Irving Albery: I could not help feeling very much concerned at the statement which was made by the right hon. Gentleman on the Motion to report Progress, and also at the reply made by the Minister. So far as I can understand it, the Committee stage of this Bill appears to have taken place in St. James's Square. The Bill has been discussed there, according to what the right hon. Gentleman said, and he has come away convinced that any Committee stage in this House would be a pure waste of time, because the Minister has made up his mind that in no circumstances will he make any concessions of any great value or of any great importance.

Sir D. Hacking: If the hon. Member will allow me, that is not quite what I said. I did not say that the Committee

stage had been wiped out in advance. I was basing my argument and reasons on what had happened in this House during the last two days' Debate, that I had felt entitled to ask for concessions and that the concessions were all refused.

Sir I. Albery: However that may be, the facts remain the same. The meeting took place at St. James's Square, and the right hon. Gentleman and his friends were given on that occasion to understand how much this Bill could or could not be amended.

Mr. Bevin: On a point of Order. What I made perfectly clear was that, as has been the practice with every Bill so far as I know, I would listen to representations from my hon. Friends and then consider whether or not I should put Amendments on the Order Paper. I gave no answer to my hon. Friends at the conference at all.

Sir I. Albery: Of course, I accept what the Minister has just said, but it still does not alter the argument that I am trying to put forward. The Minister, of course, had every right to discuss the Bill with people interested in it. The point I am trying to make is that either there is substance or not in the statement that has been made that the Minister is unwilling to consider any further Amendment. At any rate other people got the impression that he is determined not to make any other concessions, not to accept any other Amendments. That is an entirely wrong and improper attitude for any Minister to take up at the beginning of a Committee stage.

Mr. Bevin: On a point of Order. I have made no such statement.

The Deputy-Chairman: I do not think that is quite a point of Order.

Sir I. Albery: I did not say that the Minister made any statement. I said that resulting from the interview the impression gained by the right hon. Gentleman and others was that it was quite hopeless to expect to get any further concessions or any Amendment accepted on the Committee stage of this Bill. When the Minister got up to reply he did not get up and say, "That is not so. I came to this House and Committee stage willing to hear all Amendments, willing to hear all arguments, and if the arguments are good, I am prepared to alter any decision


which I may have formerly come to." All I wish to say in conclusion is this: If the Business of this House is to be conducted on these lines, then what some Members of this House have frequently suggested may as well be put into operation, and we might sit, not for longer hours as has been suggested but meet, say, once a week to hear the Prime Minister, and that will be sufficient.

Mr. Buchanan: I would like to say a word of what I think of this Measure. On this occasion I want to defend the Minister. I am very loath to disagree with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking), because he is helping the Bill to get through, but I must confess that I do not quite appreciate a Parliamentary situation in which one says, "I want to alter a Bill, I want to change it, so the way I change it is to withdraw my Amendments." Such a Parliamentary situation, to use a Glasgow phrase, is just daft. No Parliamentarian would ever dream of accepting it as an excuse. The only excuse I can take, and I hope I am not being offensive, is that I think those who are opposing the Bill are just running away, and they are trying to do it with a brave face and to find excuses. That is the position as I see it. I am surprised at the hon. Member for Gravesend (Sir I. Albery) being so terribly annoyed about the Minister not accepting Amendments. He and I have sat in this House a long while and sat through days and nights with Ministers refusing Amendment after Amendment.

Mr. Craik Henderson: Does the hon. Member not realise that this is a non-controversial Bill?

Mr. Buchanan: I remember an old Member of this House, a well-known Conservative, the late Member for the Pollak Division of Glasgow, Sir John Gilmour, on the Lotteries Bill. That was non-controversial, and the present Prime Minister endeavoured to get him to see his point of view. Common sense facts were put, but that was all the more reason why they were turned down. The Home Secretary just said, "No." He knew if he argued with him intelligently he was finished. I fought the old Anomalies Act, starting at 3 o'clock in the afternoon and going on till the middle of next day. I was responsible for practically all the

Amendments. We fought and fought and never got a single concession—not one. That is not uncommon.
May I say about the Minister that I was one of the critics, when he came here, of his Parliamentary style? I thought he was introducing too much of the trade union boss into Parliamentary affairs. I say this to him, and to his credit, that I think that as a Parliamentary figure he has improved considerably. I think that as a model of decency in debate and in attempting to be courteous he has done the job well and certainly, I think, done it in a reasonable way. May I say to those who are opposing him that Parliament has treated them with toleration? If this had been a normal peacetime and this a Bill which the Government of the day had been running, they would have had you sitting all through the night and would have used all the powerful forces of the Government. Many of your Amendments would never have been discussed. In peace-time I have seen pages of Amendments disposed of by closure and by the guillotine and what we called the old kangaroo. On this Bill there have been more courtesy and Amendments than on any Bill for some years. Far from complaining there should be recognition that the Minister has met representations and has met those opposing the Bill on some Amendments.

Hon. Members: Which?

Mr. Buchanan: I happen to be involved in important negotiations with my union, and I know my own weaknesses. If I had come here, I might have been involved in discussion. But I was present yesterday a good deal of the day and I heard the Amendment of the hon. Member for East Birkenhead (Mr. Graham White) being accepted by the Minister. I heard the Minister saying to one of the Members for Nottingham that he would try to see what he could do in a certain reasonable fashion, and he gave him certain reasonable guarantees, for which he was thanked, publicly thanked, for his splendid way of meeting them. Let me say frankly on the Catering Bill that, far from having any cause for complaint, those who have been opposing it have been treated with more toleration than they would have been treated in peacetime by a Government. From the standards of opposition yesterday, I think that if the Government had taken their courage


in their hands and sat until 10 p.m., there would have been no opposition left at all.

Mr. Levy: I was amazed at my right hon. Friend showing the white flag, an unconditional surrender, a complete capitulation, and grovelling and pleading for some concession which he hoped that the Minister would make on consideration. I should think that there is no precedent through the long history of the House of Commons for anything of that kind. So far as I am concerned, I take no part in support of the unconditional surrender. My view was that the Committee stage should have been fought properly. All the Clauses should have been examined, there should have been arguments with regard to the Amendments, and they should have been taken to a Division. Under the proper Parliamentary procedure those Members who take part in endeavouring to improve a Bill have done their duty. Referring to what the hon. Member for Gorbals (Mr. Buchanan) said, I had the honour to sit on the Committee upstairs when the right hon. Gentleman introduced——

The Deputy-Chairman: We are considering a Motion to report Progress on this Bill. That has nothing to do with anything upstairs.

Mr. Levy: On a point of Order. Are we entitled to make some reference to other Bills in order to develop an argument?

The Deputy-Chairman: A very limited reference, but it has been rather too wide so far.

Mr. Levy: With regard to the Bill to which the hon. Member referred, I had the honour to sit on the Committee upstairs, and then, because they could make no progress, it was brought downstairs. At that time the guillotine was used. The Measure before us is claimed to be non-controversial. Everyone except the Minister knows that it is highly controversial, and they dare not use the guillotine by virtue of the fact that that would prove absolutely how controversial it is, and they would be unable to maintain the Government pledge that no controversial Measure would be introduced into this House. So far as I am concerned, I am quite prepared to argue whatever Amendments are moved, to try to show the

Committee that they are for the benefit and improvement of the Bill, and to take them to a Division. I feel confident that if Members in all parts of the House are impressed by the logic of the arguments we put forward in favour of any Amendment which is likely to create an improvement in the Bill, they will be prepared, in spite of what any Minister says to the contrary, to vote for it.

Mr. Woodburn: The hon. Member says, "we." Is this a new party, or of whom does he speak?

The Deputy-Chairman: The hon Member would not be entitled to reply to that question.

Mr. Levy: It is speaker's licence.

Mr. Molson: No one who has the interests of Parliamentary procedure at heart can have heard the announcement of my right hon. Friend the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking) without deep regret. I shall try not to be controversial in anything I say; but to those of us who remember the Committee stages of Bills before the war, it seems extraordinary what an element of intolerance has crept into this discussion, and, if I may say so, not only on one side. I do not think my right hon. Friend the Member for Chorley has been quite fair to the Minister of Labour. The Minister has made it quite plain from the beginning that this was a Bill which had been decided upon by the Government as a whole, and that they had no intention of allowing it to be amended to such an extent that it would not serve the purposes for which it was introduced. The fact that the right hon. Gentleman and his friends voted against the Second Reading of the Bill indicated quite plainly, in a Parliamentary manner, that they were opposed to the Bill. It has always been the custom that when an opposition has failed on the Second Reading it has then proceeded to put down a number of Amendments on the Committee stage. If, greatly venturing I may say so, I regret that those hon. Members who were associated with me in supporting this Bill seemed to resent some of the time that has been spent in the discussion of perfectly reasonable Amendments. I feel that it is due to the fact that this House has for so long not been engaged on its proper legislative work that this element


of intolerance has crept in, on both sides. I can think of nothing more undesirable than that at this time when we are fighting to preserve government by discussion, and when there should be a broad and a tolerant spirit on both sides, this thing should have happened. I hope that this will not be a precedent. If there has been among some of my friends and associates in this matter a little intolerance towards the right hon. Member for Chorley and his friends, I cannot help regretting what I can only describe as a sulky withdrawal from a Parliamentary contest—[Interruption.] I withdraw that word. I do not wish to be controversial. I regret that he should have withdrawn instead of conducting the Debate to the end in a traditional Parliamentary manner.

Mr. Driberg: I want to counter the extraordinary revival by the hon. Member for Elland (Mr. Levy), and one other hon. Member, of the old discredited argument that this Bill was in some way a breach of the Government's pledge.

The Deputy-Chairman: We cannot go into the matter of the Government's pledge at this stage. This is merely a question of reporting Progress.

Mr. Driberg: With all respect, you did allow the hon. Member for Elland to make this mis-statement. Can I not contradict him?

The Deputy-Chairman: Then I made a mistake: that is all; and I am sorry.

Mr. Driberg: I want to congratulate the Minister on his steadfastness. The hon. and gallant Member who referred to Tunisia seems to forget that this Bill was introduced because of the Minister's desire to see that these men fighting out there get a fair chance of a job afterwards.

Mr. Bevin: May I appeal to my right hon. Friend to withdraw his Motion now, and to allow us to get on? I make an earnest appeal to him to do so.

Captain Peter Macdonald: Before the Motion is withdrawn, I should like to say a few words. I have been very closely associated with the opposition to this Bill from the outset, and I intend to oppose it until the end, not because I am opposed to wages boards in this or any other industry, but because I

think this is an ill-timed and a bad Bill. But I would like to defend the Minister against any charge that has been made of hole-and-corner methods of negotiation at St. James's Square. I was one of the parties involved. The procedure was perfectly normal and straightforward, and such as has been followed by every Minister during the time I have been in this House. On the other hand, the Minister was not correct in his impression that at the end we were satisfied, or that he had met us on any material point.

Mr. Bevin: It was only a hope.

Captain Macdonald: We submitted certain objections. He did meet us on small points—one, in particular, was a legal point—but we came away quite convinced that he was not going to make any definite concessions. That conviction has been confirmed in the last two days, because he has not given way at all; although I thank him for one promise he made yesterday, about urging his Commission to look into matters which I referred to in the Debate. I find myself in a very awkward position. In spite of what the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) said about Parliamentary procedure, it is quite impossible to take the Committee stage in the old rough and tumble way we did before the war, because our time is very definitely limited. Yesterday the opponents of this Bill were quite prepared to sit into the night, but the Government decided that the Debate should close three hours after the ordinary time of Adjournment; and it did so. To-day, after only five Clauses have been considered, we find ourselves with a few hours left to consider the remainder.

Sir H. Williams: We can have as many hours as we like.

Captain Macdonald: We were told that, as an alternative, we could have another day in the next series of Sittings, but that we should be jettisoning important legislation. I am one of those who pressed for a continuation of the Debate on the Colonies. That has been conceded for the third Sitting Day. It is very important that we should have that Debate. If we continue to-day's Debate on the first Sitting Day, all that day's Business is to be pushed back, and probably we shall miss the continued Debate on the Colonies. The Prime Minister has told us that he is suspending the Rule for only


one hour. What is the use of that, with all these Amendments? I intend to continue to oppose the Bill; but I do not think that we have had a square deal from the start, and I do not think that we are going to get one. We asked to have the Committee stage taken upstairs, where every argument could have been heard, without interfering with Business on the Floor of the House. That request was turned down, and everything else we have asked for from the start has been refused. The Minister will have his Bill, and it will be the most unpopular Act that has ever been passed.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: As the leader of a party of one, I shall be a model of brevity. I merely rise to congratulate the right hon. Gentleman, and also the Chief Whip for that matter, on having so easily won this fight.

Sir Leonard Lyle: I entriely support what has been said by my hon. and gallant Friend behind me, that it is absolutely essential that this House should retain its rights and Privileges free and unfettered for dealing with Bills in Committee. It has been unfairly said of some of us, because we put down Amendments, that we were trying to obstruct this Bill. We put the Amendments down because we genuinely felt that we could improve the Bill by so doing. I think that this is a thoroughly bad Bill, and I hoped to improve it; but I think certain Members have been rather ungrateful. I propose to remain here, and I am going to argue points which I believe ought to be argued. But that is not to say that I cannot quite see the point of my hon. Friends who have taken another view, and who say they see no purpose in carrying on the Debate. Let us be fair. Some of us have been accused of trying to be obstructive, but when my right hon. Friend the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking) follows the advice of the Prime Minister himself, who told us how important the Business is, and of the Minister of Labour, who appealed to us to cut the thing as short as possible, all that he gets is the accusation that he is running away. [An HON. MEMBER: "By people who were not here yesterday."] By people who were not here yesterday. I propose to speak on certain points. But my hon. Friends want genuinely to help the Minister, to help the Prime Minister,

to help the Government, and to get other Business through.

Sir Joseph Lamb: I hope that anything that I say will not be regarded as controversial at all. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking) has been a Member of Parliament for many years, and I have had the honour to be here for 20 years. I would make a personal appeal to him as an old Member of the House not to create a precedent and to withdraw his Motion.

Mr. Muff: I want to emphasise the point made by the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams). He gave some gratuitous advice to some 150 Members who have come into this House since the war and reminded us that we ought to go back to the bad old days of continual obstruction, of which he himself is a master.

The Deputy-Chairman: The question of the bad old days of obstruction does not come in here.

Mr. Muff: I will conclude by referring to another old Parliamentary hand—my right hon. Friend the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking), who has adopted an attitude, which, I hope, will be taken as a precedent when the good old days come, and we shall not spend wasted days in discussing things unduly in Committee when we could get on with the job.

Sir Adam Maitland: I have taken an opposite view of the Bill to that of my hon. Friends who have been proposing Amendments, but, in my judgment, they have taken a very wise and sensible course in the method which has been announced to-day. We are not in peace-time. They have shown, by their attendance and the way in which they have moved their Amendments, a deep sense of objection to the proposals of the Bill. That is the right way and good Parliamentary tactics. I am grateful to them for the consideration they have shown in attempting at this time to meet the general accommodation of the Committee. It does not mean in any sense that there is any departure from old established Parliamentary principles. There is a recognition on the part of my hon. Friends, who have taken, and still take, a decided objection to this Measure, of greater Measures and greater interests which can be discussed during the time of


Parliament. In thanking them for the course they have adopted I wish to say—and it is in the interest of Parliament that this should be done, as we have no official Opposition now—that, on any Bill, it is a good thing that Members should take the trouble to put down Amendments, so that the real purpose of the Bill can be explained. I hope that in the time which is available for the discussion of the Committee stage of this Bill, if we have not reached those Amendments which are, in their view, of great principle, they will leave them on the Order Paper for discussion on the Report stage.

Sir D. Hacking: In spite of the disagreement on my proposals, I still think that I have done the right thing, and in these circumstances I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Motion.

Motion, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," by leave, withdrawn.

CLAUSE 6.—(General provisions as to wages board).

The Solicitor-General (Major Sir David Maxwell Fyfe): I beg to move, in page 4, line 41, to leave out "category of," and to insert "of the."
This Amendment and the consequential Amendment which comes in line 44 are really of the importance of drafting Amendments now, in view of the discussion that we had on the word "classes" during yesterday. This Clause gives power to the wages boards to ask the Minister for an advisory committee, and it is considered that these committees will probably deal with geographical areas. Therefore the word "category" is not apt to describe workers in a geographical area, and we ask the Committee to omit that word and leave it in the other form. We discussed the general question of the introduction of the word "classes" and I am not going to repeat the arguments which we went into then.

Sir H. Williams: I would be glad if the learned Solicitor-General would clarify the matter a little more. I am sorry that constituency engagements prevented my being here yesterday. He said that the purpose was to arrange wages boards on a geographical basis.

The Solicitor-General: If my hon. Friend will look at Sub-section (2) of the

Clause, he will see that the procedure is that any wages board may request the Minister to appoint a committee, that is, an advisory committee, and it is the advisory committee who will consider the matters referred to them on a geographical basis.

Sir H. Williams: I am sorry that I made a slip and said "wages boards" when I meant to say "committees." But look at the position. Take, for example, that great institution who have multiple shops known as Lyons', who are great public benefactors. They have their shops spread all over the country. I understand that it is proposed, if there should be some desire to examine the circumstances in Lyons' teashops, that you will do it on a geographical basis. You will examine teashops in London but not similar tea-shops in other cities. If it is on a geographical basis instead of in regard to the general body of people working in tea-shops of that character—because there is not only Lyons but the A.B.C. and a Whole range of similar establishments of that character—it would rule out similar teashops in all parts of the country. Therefore, the learned Solicitor-General ought to give a little more information on the real significance of the Amendment. I have studied it, but I really do not understand its real significance. Although there was a discussion yesterday, I do not think that the comments of the Solicitor-General really carry us as far as we ought to go before this Amendment is put from the Chair.

The Solicitor-General: I appreciate that my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) could not be with us yesterday, and it is rather difficult to get the full significance of this Amendment unless my hon. Friend has in mind the discussion we had on "classes." I am very anxious that he should be satisfied, and I therefore draw his attention to the fact that this is a permissive enactment, which says:
Any wages board may request the Minister to appoint a committee.
Therefore it is a matter, first of all, for the wages board to decide whether they want a committee, and then, what sort of committee they want. They may want, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon has said, a committee which will examine a general problem without geographical limits. On the other hand, they


may want only a section which is limited geographically to be inquired into by the committee. If the second is their desire, then the word "category" is not apt to describe workers in a geographical district. I think that that puts the reason for the Amendment clearly to my hon. Friend.

Amendment agreed to.

Major Petherick: I beg to move, in page 4, line 42, after "operates," to insert "and their employers."
I move this Amendment, which stands in the name of my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for East Nottingham (Major Gluckstein). The Sub-section lays it down:
Any wages board may request the Minister to appoint a committee for any category of workers in relation to whom the Board operates.
We suggest that these committees should include also their employers. What is wanted in these circumstances is a joint committee, and I call the attention of the Minister to this point in the hope that he can see his way to accept the Amendment.

The Joint-Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Labour (Mr. McCorquodale): We do not think that these words are necessary. To meet the point which my hon. and gallant Friend has in mind, I would call his attention to the constitution of the committee as provided in Clause 8 (1b) in the Second Schedule, which provides for the representatives of employers.

Major Petherick: Are not the words in the Sub-section rather long, and will the hon. Gentleman consider with the draftsmen between now and the Report stage whether they are necessary or not?

Mr. McCorquodale: I will look into it.

Major Petherick: I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Sir L. Lyle: I beg to move, in page 4, line 44, after "to," to insert:
the remuneration, conditions of employment, health or comfort of.
The Committee will see that under the Clause:
Any wages board may request the Minister to appoint a committee for any category of workers in relation to whom the board operates

and the Minister shall appoint a committee accordingly, and the board may refer to it for a report and recommendations any matter relating to that category of workers which the board think it expedient so to refer.
What I, and, I think, several other hon. Members feel is that the words "any matter relating to that category of workers" might include anything, including the efficiency and development—which is another point we wish to argue later on—of the section of the industry in which they work. Those who think with me suggest that the wages boards should confine themselves strictly to wages and to conditions of employment of health and comfort and all those things, but they should leave the other extraneous matters to the trade associations who are far better able to deal witih them. No industry can conduct its affairs properly if all sorts of committees are set up, and we are not trying to interfere with the hours and conditions of employment and wages but simply want the words specifically referred to here to be inserted to make it clear that they will have to deal with remuneration, conditions of employment, health and comfort.

Sir H. Williams: I would like to support the Amendment, which, I think, would be helpful to the Bill. If at any time a wage board makes a request to the Minister to appoint a committee to carry out an inquiry and the terms of reference are made as wide as possible under Subsection (2), I can see all sorts of trouble arising and people in the industry protesting on the ground that the scope of the Measure was drawn so widely that matters could be introduced that were extraneous and so produce a sense of disharmony, which should be avoided. If the Bill becomes law, I want it to work as well as possible. I think that if you do not draw the terms of reference within the appropriately narrow field, you are asking for trouble. After all, the main purpose of this Bill is to deal with catering wages. It is true that in the Preamble there are the words:
efficiency and development of the industries in which they are employed.
But I imagine that they were put there for the purpose of trying to carry the baby a bit, because this Bill will not deal very much with that aspect. In spite of the optimism of the Minister, who thinks tourists will come to this country because


of the Bill, they will not; they will come to this country to see the bomb damage and that sort of thing. If you pass a Sub-section in which it is possible to refer any matter, even conditions attending work at a cup-tie at Wembley, it will lead to trouble.

Mr. Bevin: I do not think it wise to say in advance to a board—because that is how these committees are appointed—that they shall not do this, that or the other in connection with the terms of reference. It is true that the Minister has to appoint them, but in practice they come into being through the industry. I do not want to argue about efficiency and development on this Clause; that comes later, but I cannot see why you should say that Parliament should lay it down in advance that a board or the Minister should not ask a committee, which is purely advisory and not mandatory, to consider a particular problem. I think that is absolutely unreasonable.

Major Petherick: The Minister said he could not ask. Surely it is the board?

Mr. Bevin: I beg the Committee's pardon. I should have said "board." If a board is not allowed to ask a committee to take up a particular question because Parliament has said in advance that it shall not, I think it would be unreasonable.

Sir H. Williams: The Minister recently, very wisely I think, set up production committees in various factories in the country, and I am very glad he did, but he definitely limited their purview on the ground that he did not want to have them discussing extraneous matters. He said it was not right to limit their scope, yet he himself, in setting up another body concerned with welfare and other matters in factories, deliberately did that. His own argument was thereby destroyed by his own action.

Mr. Bevin: The reason that production committees' powers were limited was because they had to fit in with the decisions of superior boards, and the whole of the collective agreements laid down what the shop committees should do. In this case the board has to make the terms of reference; it will set up a committee and will accept or reject the committee's report.

Sir H. Williams: Because it is superior and should be said so in advance. We are the superior power.

Mr. Craik Henderson: Is this not a rather dangerous attitude that the Minister is taking up? He states that he does not want to limit the powers of the committee, but surely it is the duty of Parliament to be as specific as possible when it confers powers on anyone. There has often been criticism in the past that Bills are passed through the House which give wide and unnecessary powers and that things are being done which it was not the intention should be done. If the Minister's argument was carried to a logical conclusion, he need have no Bill of 19 Clauses; he could simply have a one Clause Bill saying that he would appoint a Commission and give it powers to do as it liked. We have an unusual situation here. We have a Commission appointed with powers to look into conditions of service and wages, and we have a wages board which is a slightly inferior body. Now we are asked to give completely unrestricted powers. I hope qualifying words will be put into the Bill to put this matter right.

Mr. Francis Watt: The point that occurred to me with regard to this matter is that we are not to have only one wages board for the industry but several, and it seems to me that different boards will have different ideas as to the scope of their power. The underlying idea of the Minister seems to be that whatever object he wants to achieve may be difficult unless he uses very wide language, and that if he used this wide language, he would get what he wanted. But that sort of thing means that there may be a great deal of unnecessary inquiry, and I ask that the position of the unfortunate taxpayer should be considered——

The Deputy-Chairman: The hon. Member cannot go into the question of payment on this Amendment.

Mr. Watt: Then I will only say that in the interests of the Bill itself and to ensure smooth working these wages boards should have before them the definite scope of their authority and the precise regions within which they can promote an inquiry.

Mr. Molson: I hope the Minister will not change his mind on this particular matter, because I do not think that the apprehensions


expressed by my hon. Friends have much substance in them. If they will turn to the Second Schedule to the Bill, they will see that the wages board is——

Mr. Craik Henderson: This has not to do with wages boards but with powers of the committee.

Mr. Molson: That is true, but it states that any wages board may request the Minister to appoint a committee, that the board may refer to it for a report and recommendations on any matters relating to a category of workers. The terms of reference to the committee are laid down by the wages board, and if you have a responsible wages board, it is far wiser to rely on that board to remit to the committee only matters which are appropriate for it to consider rather than to leave Parliament to define the scope.

Sir L. Lyle: I am not convinced or satisfied by the arguments made in opposition to my Amendment. This Bill was introduced for the purpose of bettering remuneration, conditions, hours, wages and health of the catering industry and was not meant to go into all sorts of other realms. The Minister has said he wants these powers, but I submit that there are other organisations in industry which can always put up other points.

Mr. Leslie: What other organisations?

Sir L. Lyle: There are many other organisations which can put forward anything of that kind.

Mr. Leslie: Name some of them.

Sir L. Lyle: The hon. Member must know who they are. At any rate I do not intend to be drawn into an argument. I think it is a mistake not to lay down through the committees what they should consider, but if the Minister can tell us that he will give further consideration to the point between now and the next stage of the Bill, I am perfectly prepared to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment made: In page 4, line 44, leave out "that category of," and insert "those."—[The Solicitor-General.]

Mr. McCorquodale: I beg to move, in page 5, line 3, to leave out from the beginning, to the second "any," in line 4, and to insert "consider."
This Amendment shows how keen my right hon. Friend is to meet any points which appeared to have legitimate backing. A number of Amendments to this Sub-section have been put down to recast it, to make it a little clearer and to meet various objections which have been raised. At the same time it might meet with approval if we considered various other Amendments in page 5, lines 7, 8, 9, 11, 14 and 16. In its amended form the Clause would read as follows——

The Temporary Chairman (Sir Robert Young): There is an Amendment which comes before that. I think it would be in order for the Committee to have a general discussion provided there was no discussion over other Amendments as they come up.

Mr. Craik Henderson: Is it quite clear that if the Parliamentary Secretary proceeds with his Amendment the important Amendment in page 5, line 7, to leave out from "operates," to the end of the Subsection, will be taken?

Sir J. Lamb: That point was also in my mind.

The Temporary Chairman: I think we will dispose of that first.

Mr. McCorquodale: This is a drafting Amendment. We leave these words out and make the Sub-section read:
In addition to the powers conferred on it by subsequent provisions in this Act any wages board shall have power to consider any matters affecting remuneration, etc.
and we add at the end:
and may submit a report thereon.

Amendment agreed to.

Sir J. Lamb: I beg to move, in page 5, line 7, to leave out from "operates" to the end of the Sub-section.
I do not think that the Amendment to which we have just agreed entirely covers the point, although I appreciate what the Committee has just done. I am speaking on behalf of the County Councils Association, and we have the agreement of other associations on the point. We contend very strongly that the Bill, which we are supporting, should deal with wages and service conditions only. We fear that, as now drawn, it gives somewhat of a roving commission to the Commission and the wages board.

Major Sir Edward Cadogan: The Parliamentary Secretary yesterday gave me an assurance.

Sir J. Lamb: We have a fear that it is too wide in its operation and that a roving commission is given, which we object to, because it would interfere with the rights, privileges and duties of local authorities. We fear that it might be possible for the wages board to make recommendations to the Board of Education on matters affecting the efficiency and development of school canteens, for instance. That is really a local government duty which should be dealt with between the Ministry of Education and the local government. We say that the proper course that that should take is that if the local government is not performing its duty in this respect, representations should be made to the local government either by Members of the House or by members of the authority to have the matter thrashed out in the light of the constitutional Measures now on the Statute Book, and we should not allow duplicate authorities to be set up which can go to the local authorities and perform this duty. This not only affects local authorities but other business, and it is very undesirable. In this Clause we are referring to the duty of the wages board and not the Commission, and I want the Minister to consider the matter as affecting the wages board. I hope he will give favourable consideration to the Amendment, which will eliminate the possibilities which we fear under the Bill as it stands.

Mr. Evelyn Walkden: Since when has the County Councils Association obtained power from the organised workers to come to the House and make suggestions which infer some kind of consultation with the trade unions? I appeal to you, Sir Robert. If the hon. Member quotes the County Councils Association as the body he represents, surely he should give the Committee an explanation.

The Temporary Chairman: It may be up to hon. Members to do so, but I have called another Member.

Major Petherick: I think the interruption which was directed at my hon. Friend was a little uncalled for. He made it clear that this was an Amendment suggested by the County Councils Association. If any individual county council objects to the action of its Association, it

has only to make its complaint in the usual way, or indeed it can discuss the matter before action is taken. I do not speak for the County Councils Association but purely as a private Member. My action on this Bill has been perfectly simple. I do not think it ought to have been introduced. It seems to me to have a number of unsatisfactory aspects, and we have moved a number of Amendments, of which this is one. I am not acting in collusion with my hon. Friend, though I have put my name to it. It seems a little curious that the right hon. Gentleman put down a previous Amendment which to some extent narrowed the power of the wages board, having refused, for precisely the same reason, to narrow the powers of the Commission. I think it is a modest improvement, but it does not go nearly far enough, because all it says is that the wages board may make any recommendations to the Minister, and those recommendations may affect the efficiency and development of that part of the industry in relation to which the board operates. I think that is really too wide. I do not think it is the job of this wages board to make recommendations about all kinds of matters.
The right hon. Gentleman will probably say that powers have been given under the Trade Boards Act to a number of trade boards to make recommendations if in the course of their investigations they happen to discover something that can be remedied in the industry and have them put right. That is rather a specious argument. There are a number of precedents for these words, but however many precedents there are, it does not justify the inclusion of words giving powers as wide as these. The right hon. Gentleman may also say that they are only recommendations and that, if the wages board makes unwise recommendations, or recommendations so wide that they ought not to be dealt with, he can turn them down, but there is the danger that they may be accepted by the Government and put into operation. The right hon. Gentleman may say that he has no power to do so and that fresh legislation would be needed to carry them out, but we cannot be so sure of that in wartime. The Government have very great powers under the Emergency Powers Act to make Regulations. If the right hon. Gentleman assured me that there is no power to implement any such recommendation under the Emergency Powers


Act, I should not persist, but I believe it is profoundly wrong and dangerous that a wages board or Commission set up for this narrow purpose should be given powers to recommend all kinds of wide developments of the industry in the future.

Mr. Bevin: I regard the retention of these words as vital. The wages board is a joint body of employers and workers and is independent, and the Bill gives them power to discuss the efficiency of their own industry. We discussed the matter at St. James's Square in view of some of these terrible fears, which are quite unreasonable. The only argument I have heard up to now is that I was going to use this power to interfere with the individual management of undertakings. That was the bogy raised in the Press, which apparently they have run away from entirely. [Interruption.] I am suggesting that the opponents of the Bill raised that in the first instance, but they have not pressed the point.
When this fear was pressed upon me I said that I would put in the words "general efficiency." I go further to-day. I am willing, in order to make my position clear as to what I want and to remove fears, to put the word "improvement" instead of "efficiency" to meet the Amendment standing in the name of the hon. Member for Streatham (Mr. Robertson). I want the board to be able, in addition to discussing wages, hours and conditions to consider the improvement of the industry. In the development of industrial relationships the more we let these boards discuss the whole facts of their industry, instead of confining them to arguing about wages, the better industrial relations will be. I speak with a long experience. I have joined many times with many employers' organisations on mutual and common ground in order to secure the more efficient running of an industry and I am very glad to have done it. If the employer invests his capital in a business, and if the State has trained men and women and they go into the business, I take the view, which I hope will be accepted by the House, that those persons who invest their lives and careers in the industry are putting capital into it just as much as the employer who invests his money. Therefore they are entitled to make their contribution to making their capital more remunerative.
Surely it is not unreasonable to put in the Bill that the wages board should be able to discuss the industry. This is not, as the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) said, a facetious thing put in to butter the Bill. I look to many ideas coming out of these joint boards to help the development of the industry. The Bill would not be worth anything if we confined their discussions to wages alone. The workpeople have many ideas if they are given the opportunity to express them. Many improvements that we are using in this war are the outcome of suggestions of ordinary workpeople and they have been extremely valuable. I am so keen on the use of the combined intelligence of these boards in advising the industry and making reports which will help the Government to come to right conclusions, that I do not mind if we use the words "improvement" or "general efficiency." I will accept either as long as the power is there for the joint board to be able to put their heads together to help the industry.

Mr. Cyril Lloyd: I speak as one who has a considerable experience of wages boards, and I do not want to be thought to be opposing them or trying to hamper their operations, but it is my experience that a wages board functions best when it sticks to its last. If the Minister wants a body to deal with the efficiency and development of a particular industry—and this is an industry of enormously wide complications covering a large number of different branches—I suggest that he is entirely wrong in placing these duties on a wages board which must be of a specialist nature, and he ought to set up a separate organisation for the purpose and be frank about it. This Clause has raised the greatest difficulty and anxiety outside the House In relation to the Bill. Much of the opposition has been on points of far less importance which I am not concerned with. This is a matter about which everybody engaged in the industry is vitally concerned. The Clause would give the wages board the power to go into every detail of the industry—how many plates of soup a waiter should carry and that sort of thing. That is not the duty of a wages board. It is the duty of a quite different body of men. It is already done by such bodies as works councils.
There is in the Clause the further word "development." Is it possible that a wages board can among its other many duties, include a discussion of the development of the industry? It has an important part to carry out in discussing wages and conditions of employment and when it has done that it has performed a useful function. It certainly should not trespass into the much wider field of efficiency and development. If it did it would do the very thing which the Minister is seeking to avoid; it would put a clog on individual enterprise in development. People would say, "I do not know what the wages board will say if I set up this particular form of catering. I might be hampered by the board asking whether I was efficient." All of us in industry are conscious of peripatetic inquiries into efficiency which are often inefficient themselves. There is no question that wages boards should stick to wages and conditions only. I hope that the Minister will consider this matter again before the Report stage, otherwise it might drive some of us to oppose the Bill on that ground, which we should be sorry to do because in many other respects we gladly support the Minister in his main objective.

Sir J. Lamb: The Minister referred to the value of the working man and his advice. Nobody denies that there are a considerable number of that type of person on our local authorities who give very good advice in managing the bodies for which local authorities are responsible. Consequently, they are not depriving the working man of the opportunity of giving his advice in any way.

Mr. Craik Henderson: We appreciate the concessions which the Minister has made, but they still leave a large question untouched. The words which we are now considering may appear quite innocuous, but if there is a fear in the House and the country the Minister must take a certain amount of responsibility for it. The Minister just now drew a picture of the wages board and the work it might carry out. On Second Reading he pictured a complete re-development of the industry by this board. If there is one thing about which many of us feel strongly, it is that there is nothing more detrimental to the efficiency and the development of an industry than that the power should be

withdrawn from the people responsible and put in the hands of a body without any responsibility to anyone. That is interference without knowledge and it can only be dangerous. Apart from that it seems to me and to many of my friends that the two functions of regulating wages and conditions of service and of considering the efficiency and development of the industry call for quite different powers. The men appointed to deal with wages and conditions need one type of mind and knowledge and the men who plan and develop a great industry should be a different sort of personnel altogether. I hope that the Minister will realise that this Clause rouses great anxiety in the country. But for it many of us would never have opposed the Bill, and if it remains as it is our opposition must continue.

Sir H. Williams: I hope that the Minister will reconsider his attitude to these words. I rather doubt whether they are well drafted even for the purpose he has in mind. The hon. Member for Stone (Sir J. Lamb), who moved the Amendment, used the argument that local authorities were rather perturbed whether these words would bring into consideration matters outside the catering which local authorities undertake. The local authorities on whose behalf he speaks are not the only local authorities to take that view. In my spare time I am an alderman of the London County Council, which is not in these days a Tory institution. The Parliamentary Committee of the Council, which has a majority of Socialist members upon it, has addressed to me a recommendation to support this Amendment. Because I am a member of the London County Council it does not mean that I am under any obligation to support anything they recommend, because I make up my own mind. When I received that recommendation I replied that I was not certain whether this could be supported purely on local government grounds, because if it is true that the London County Council run a catering service and that these words would bring in the power to examine other aspects of the work of the London County Council, it would apply also to any business that has a canteen. Therefore, the Minister, without realising it, may be conferring upon the wages boards designed to operate for the catering trade the power to look into matters completely outside the


catering industry. The legal advisers of the organisations of local authorities have come to the conclusion that these words are undesirable because they represent the greatest degree of interference with the proper functions of the Minister of Health and others. I hear sundry burbles from behind from an hon. Member who likes to burble, but I would point out to him what he did not appear to realise, until I announced that on this occasion I am speaking at the request of a committee with a Socialist majority, that these people having heard, I presume, the best legal advice they could have, have come to the conclusion that these words contain dangers quite apart from others that have been indicated. Therefore, I ask the Minister to give urgent consideration to this matter; otherwise he will have mobilised against him in the later stages of the Bill a vast body of opinion inspired by quite different reasons from those which have inspired the opposition up to now.

Mr. Robertson: I did not intend to intervene on this Amendment, but in view of the fact that my right hon. Friend has stated that he is willing to accept my Amendment changing the word "efficiency" to "improvement," I think I might make a few remarks, because I have some special knowledge of the catering trade. I am chairman of a small nautical catering trade company in London, and after some years of experience I have come to the conclusion that the industry is capable of great improvement, but that this can only be Drought about by getting both sides in the industry to come together as they will be brought together by wages boards. Single firms are unable on their own to take the effective action which is urgently demanded. I can think of many improvements which will result. In many London restaurants air-conditioning is urgently required. Have hon. Members been in kitchens and seen the conditions under which people have to work, with ranges which not only create heat for cooking food but cause the workers to sweat excessively? Such equipment might do for a bygone age when there was nothing better, but to-day better equipment is available.

Sir H. Williams: Is the hon. Member aware that under Section 91 of the Public Health Act, 1875, it is already the duty of every local authority to abate a

nuisance, and what he has described would be a nuisance within the terms of that Section?

Mr. Robertson: I am not aware of that particular Section, but I am well aware that powers do exist, and equally well aware that they are not always applied. Anyone who knows the conditions prevailing in the restaurants run in Soho by foreigners would agree that the regulations referred to are not carried out.

Mr. Craik Henderson: My hon. Friend has referred to certain things which he says ought to be done. Would they not all be covered by the words "conditions of employment, health or welfare"?

Mr. Robertson: I do not agree with that view. Let me give another example. In the public house trade, a very big section of this industry, the highest rate of mortality exists. I believe that state of affairs could be cured by tearing out the fronts of the older public houses, so that light and air could get in. That would improve the health of the workers, but it would cost a great deal of money, and it is only if every one in the industry is compelled to do it that such improvements can be secured. In many restaurants in London there is no adequate accommodation for the staff to take meals, or for washing up, or lavatory accommodation. Workers in kitchens work in a semi-naked condition, and there should be proper facilities for them to change their clothing. Many improvements are wanted, but they can only be brought about by both sides getting together and by prices being increased reasonably to permit of improvements being undertaken, because they are very much overdue. Then there is the matter of tipping.

The Temporary Chairman: The question of tipping has already been dealt with on a previous Amendment.

Mr. Robertson: I only wanted to make the point that a great improvement could be effected in the remuneration of staffs through wages boards. Then prices could be increased and better wages paid and tips completely avoided.

Sir Harold Webbe: I had not intended to intervene in this discussion, but the nervousness which I have felt for some time as to the meaning and effect of the words under


discussion has certainly not been allayed by some of the speeches which I have heard. The speech of the hon. Member for Streatham (Mr. Robertson) fills me with dismay and I think must have caused even the Minister a certain amount of anxiety. Surely the matters to which he referred all fall within the terms "welfare and conditions of service"—except, possibly, the knocking down of the fronts of hotels and public houses, which seems to be a pretty tall order for a wages board dealing with a particular section of an industry.

Mr. Robertson: Is it a tall order in an industry where the workers have the highest mortality in Great Britain?

Sir H. Webbe: I did not say that it was a tall order in itself, but rather a tall order for a wages board. Surely if that is an evil to be remedied it ought not to be done in a round-the-corner way by the machinery of a wages board intended for a very different purpose. Nor have my anxieties been allayed by the case made by the Minister himself. I do not like having to correct my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams), but if my understanding is correct I think he made a little mistake about the attitude of the Parliamentary Committee of the London County Council. My reading of the resolution was that they supported not this particular Amendment but another Amendment in the name of the hon. Member for Stone (Sir. J. Lamb).

Sir H. Williams: When the hon. Member for Stone (Sir J. Lamb) moved his Amendment, I was a bit dubious about the interpretation and I took the opportunity of consulting him, and his information confirms mine that it is these particular words that have given rise to the difficulty.

Sir H. Webbe: That is not a point which I think I ought to pursue here. It is one between myself and the hon. Member for South Croydon. I am frankly perturbed by the case which the Minister made. He delivered a powerful speech in support of these particular words and has claimed that the provisions of the Clause are of great value, of far reaching importance and of profound significance. I have read the Bill with considerable care and for that reason I deplore the position in

which we find ourselves, while I am unfortunately obliged to accept the view expressed by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking). I fail to find anywhere in the Bill any provision which gives either the Minister of Labour or any other Minister or Government Department any power whatever other than the power they already have to carry out any suggestions which may be made by a wages board. If there is no power to do it, surely it is surprising—if the Minister has nothing behind what he says—that he should be so vitally anxious that these wages boards should be the channel through which the views either of labour or employers on matters of this kind are to be conveyed to the authorities for their consideration. He may say that the Bill does one thing and I appreciate that it does. It does put upon Government Departments other than the Ministry of Labour an obligation to have regard to the existence of this machinery of the Commission and the wages boards. It pledges them to consider any recommendations which are made to them. That is something.
We have been asked to take a great deal on trust, and I am prepared to trust the ordinary Minister of the ordinary Government Department, without the stimulus of a Clause in a Bill, to consider—which is all they can do—any recommendations which come from any responsible statutory body. Why need these words be put in at all? If there were no other means by which employers or groups of employers, workers or groups of workers, could bring things to the notice of authority, where it has any power to intervene, then I could understand the Minister supporting these words, I could understand his putting up a mild case for them, but I could not even then understand the extreme urgency and zeal which he displayed and the great importance which he attached to them. But there are many organisations of employers and powerful organisations of workers in existence. It is true that up to the present the trade unions—to whom all honour for the great work they have done in other industries—have not been able to get a foothold in the catering industry. It is not for me to discuss why. There may be many views on why they have not, but it is a fact. The passing of this Bill must in my view, and I have no regrets about it, lead to a very much wider


influx of trade unionism into the catering industry, so that through the ordinary channels of organised labour and of organised employers there will be ample opportunities for ideas which may be for the benefit of the whole trade or any section of it to be brought forward, ventilated and submitted to the appropriate Government Departments for any action which they can take. Therefore, I cannot see the reason for these words, and still less can I understand the great importance the Minister attaches to them, and he must not take it amiss if some of us become suspicious of what he has in his mind when his actions appear to be so completely inexplicable.

Mr. Molson: I have a feeling that some of the arguments in support of this Amendment are based upon a misunderstanding, and that this is particularly the case in the speech made by my hon. Friend the Member for the Abbey Division (Sir H. Webbe). He said that he would not be supporting this Amendment if in the industry there were representatives of workers and employers who would be able to make representations of this kind to the Government. I think he has overlooked the fact that the wages boards are to be set up only in cases where the Commission has investigated the conditions and has found that there are no organisations representing the employers and the employed parties respectively.

Sir H. Webbe: I do not like to interrupt my hon. Friend, but surely wages boards are to be set up where there is no organised method of dealing with wages and conditions. In the catering trade there already exist many organisations of employers and some organisations of employees but they are not directly organised to deal with wages and conditions. There are no circumstances of the kind in which I can see that a wages board can be set up.

Mr. Molson: I take it that, in cases where there is a reasonable organisation representative of employers and employees able to deal with these matters, there would be no need for it, and the situation would not arise. Another clear example of the sort of misunderstanding in my hon. Friend's contention was illustrated by the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Cyril Lloyd). He spoke about undue interference in the administration of individual concerns, and, as an example of what he has in

mind, he spoke of wages boards laying down the number of plates of soup which might be carried by an individual waiter. That is again a thing covered, not in the words which it is proposed to leave out, but under the conditions of employment.

Sir H. Williams: No.

Mr. Molson: I take it as quite clear that it would come under the conditions of employment. [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I feel that the Minister of Labour has made it clear that it is not his intention that there should be any undue interference, or interference at all, with the administration of individual concerns and that he has stated in his speech that he is prepared either to accept the word "improvement" in the place of "efficiency" or, if it is more acceptable to the Committee, to insert the word "general," which does, I feel, cover completely the case which has been put forward.

The Solicitor-General: We have had this problem discussed from various points of view, and I thought it might be helpful to the Committee if I considered it from three aspects which had been dealt with up to now. The first is, to put on one side the red light which my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) has suggested about the actual wording of the Clause. My hon. Friend expressed the fear, and said that it was shared by certain of his informants, that it might apply to other activities of local authorities, and indeed to industrial concerns. As I construe these words, when one reads about the general efficiency, or improvement as is foreshadowed in the Amendment, and development of that part of the industry in relation to which the board operates, that is clearly confined to the catering industry and could not, by any stretch of interpretation, be taken outside it. Although my hon. Friend very rightly mentioned it, he only directed our attention to it, and did not elaborate any argument for a different interpretation. Frankly, I have not been able to find one.
I come to the next point, which the Committee has to face, and that is: Is there any Member of the Committee who is against an increase in the general efficiency or, if you will, improvement or development of the industry? [HON. MEMBERS: "No."] I gather that every


one would say that we are all in favour of that. Therefore, there is no desire and no suggestion that the improvement and development of the industry do not require all the assistance and good will that they can get from anyone who is prepared to give it. That is the postulate from which we start. Now we come to two points that have been raised as to the actual method. My bon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. Cyril Lloyd) suggested that this was interference. That word has been bandied about before. We must bear in mind who are going to give the consideration. They are wages boards, with certain independent members and representatives of employers and workmen. I have listened with great care to all the argument that has been advanced by the opponents of this board, and I cannot see, and I cannot understand, how my hon. Friend has sought to prove it, nor can I understand the suggestion coming from him that a body including representatives of both sides of the industry is unfit to consider questions involving its improvement and development. It is difficult to consider any other body that would be more fit, and I really do fail to understand how my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley can term it interference when that body contains representatives of both sides of the industry. How is it interfering? It is merely considering, and considering with perfect propriety, the condition of its own house.

Mr. C. Lloyd: I may have used the word "interference," but I am not conscious that I did so, and I do not think I did use it. My point is that a wages board is not a suitable body for considering the development and efficiency of the industry.

The Solicitor-General: I am prepared to meet that point. I certainly understood my hon. Friend to use the term "interference," but if I am wrong I apologise at once. It certainly has been used, and if I have attributed it wrongly to my hon. Friend, I apologise. I hasten to meet his argument. Again, he says that a wages board is not suitable to consider the improvement or development of an industry. That is what we have been looking for. The same argument that I have advanced a few moments ago surely applies to the consideration now put forward by my hon. Friend. They are

representatives of employers and employed in the industry, with an independent leaven who are there to ease the matter. I should have been very surprised if my hon. Friend, with regard to the industry of which he is so distinguished a member, had said that a body, a representative, responsibly appointed body, of workers and employers, was not a suitable body to make general suggestions as to the improvement and development of the industry. The fact that they have been appointed with the primary purpose of considering the wages and conditions of labour and of welfare in that industry seems to give them added weight and responsibility on the general question.

Sir H. Williams: Is the Solicitor-General not aware that very often an organisation of employers will send to a wages board somebody from their directorate who is experienced in regard to the problems of employment and wages and such matters, whereas if they want somebody to represent them on the subject of trade development, they send an entirely different person? It is just like asking a surgeon to perform the functions of a physician.

Sir H. Webbe: I am sure the Solicitor-General does not wish in any way to be unfair. May I ask him to make clear the character of these wages boards in another particular? He has quite rightly explained their function and how they are constituted, but he has not stressed what seems to me to be very relevant to this matter, that each wages board will not be representative of the industry but only of a section of the industry with which it is charged to deal. It is a sectional body, and seems, to be the wrong kind of body to deal with general questions of improvement and development.

The Solicitor-General: May I, without judging the relevant importance of these interruptions, take them in chronological order and deal with them? My hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon, who is showing such intense interest in the matter at the moment, made a point. As with most points that he makes, it is a good debating point for the moment, but, like a few of his points, a very few, it does not carry consideration for very long. I will put this to my hon. Friend. In the one case the difference which he has suggested between some member of a


directorate specially concerned with labour who has not any knowledge of the industry as a whole is, to my mind an unfortunate and I hope rare individual. That does not apply here, because this is new machinery, and wages boards are to be given this power. I do not accept from my hon. Friend or from anyone else that employers' associations are so poor in material that they cannot find somebody who can perform this double function. I do not accept it for a moment.

Sir H. Williams: The important thing is to get the best man to do the job. I know that the Solicitor-General is in great difficulties, and that is why he is speaking in this fashion. If he has a bad throat, he goes to a laryngologist, but if he is suffering from some other complaint, he goes to a specialist in that complaint. In industry everybody specialises, just as doctors and lawyers do. If I want a barrister I go to a barrister, but if I only want a solicitor I go to a solicitor.

The Solicitor-General: I do not want to go at great length into the recesses of industry with which my hon. Friend is so particularly acquainted. I put the matter to the general sense of the Committee that to suggest that in any ordinary catering establishment you cannot find a director who, in addition to his own knowledge of wages and conditions, has not a general feeling and acquaintance with his industry sufficient to enable him to consider a problem of this sort is a travesty of the facts. I leave it to the sense of the Committee.
I promised to deal with the point raised by the hon. Member for the Abbey Division (Sir H. Webbe), which was that the wages board was, under the words we are considering, representative of only part of an industry. My hon. Friend said that as it was dealing only with the wages of a part of the industry, it could not make recommendations as to the improvement or development of the industry as a whole. Will that contention really stand consideration? Let us take any section of the industry. Suppose that the wages board has been held in relation to public houses, to seaside boarding houses, or seaside hotels. I was going to say that I had great experience of public houses. Then I thought that might be misinterpreted. But I did intend to say that for a great part of my professional life I had, among other things, made applications for

licences for public houses and considered the requirements of all the bodies, not only the licensing justices, but every other body that has laid down and dealt with the place of the public house in the nation.
I say that it is absolutely absurd, with respect, apart from the fact my hon. Friend suggested, to suggest that those who are concerned with the supplying and direction of public houses do not know about the general state of the catering industry. I am equally sure that applies to those who are concerned with hotels and indeed with boarding houses in the various seaside places, whose case was so eloquently put before us yesterday by a number of hon. Members who represent them. They know what they are talking about. They are concerned, and as was clear from the speeches by the hon. and gallant Member for the Isle of Wight (Captain P. Macdonald) and the hon. Member for Lowestoft (Mr. Loftus) and a number of others yesterday, their constituents know very well the future of the industry on which they so largely depend, and are keen upon it.
I suggest—and I hope the hon. Member for the Abbey Division will not take my use of the word "absurd" in any sense other than a debating one; he knows it would be the last thing I should desire to do—that when you consider that these boards come into operation, I agree for the primary purpose of considering wages and conditions, but with the secondary purpose, which is clear before them of considering development and improvement, the fact that they may primarily be concerned with wages and conditions is no disadvantage. It is a point on which my hon. Friends in many quarters of the House feel strongly, and it is a point on which the Minister has expressed his own concern. Therefore I do want to say that whatever be our primary views—and in this Committee every possible view as to the relation between industry and Government Departments in their widest sense is represented—we have in this case to consider whether or not we approve of this principle, which is that members of the industry representing both sides of the industry brought to consider important questions in the industry should be allowed to make representations as to its future, its improvement and its development. I submit that when we consider the machinery of supply it would


be a great misfortune if it went out that in this Committee we did not want a representative body of both sides of the industry to perform that beneficent task.

Mr. Evelyn Walkden: On a point of Order. During the Debate on this particular Amendment the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams), if I may remind the Committee, used an argument which certainly seemed to serve him well, that he was privileged now to be in a position to speak for the London County Council, and he used their good name in the argument that they favoured this Amendment we are now discussing. I was very concerned at the time——

The Temporary Chairman: I ask the hon. Member to remember that this is a point of Order.

Mr. Walkden: It is a point of Order because of the claim made by the hon. Member.

The Temporary Chairman: I am listening, but the hon. Gentleman has not yet come to his point of Order.

Mr. Walkden: It is simply that when the claim was made the hon. Member referred to a letter which he had, but he did not produce it. The letter is here. The L.C.C. ——

The Temporary Chairman: That is not a point of Order.

Mr. Walkden: It is a point of explanation.

Sir A. Maitland: Will you, Sir Robert, accept a Motion that the Question be now put?

Mr. Montague: May I put a point to you, Sir Robert, that there is a point of correction to be made? In what way would an hon. Member be in Order to correct the statement made by the hon. Member for South Croydon? I know as well as the hon. Member who raised the point of Order that that statement was incorrect. I think that ought to be said in the Committee.

The Temporary Chairman: If the hon. Member had interrupted the hon. Member for South Croydon, he would probably have given way for a correction. If the hon. Member wishes to make a correction or contradiction, he must do so by being called in Debate.

Mr. Lewis: I venture to suggest to the Committee that whatever words we leave in this Clause, whatever words we take out of this Clause, as a matter of fact when the wages boards are set up the members of them will discuss among themselves all sorts of questions relating to the welfare of their industry. They will in fact discuss them. Therefore it seems to me that the issue between the Government and those who support this Amendment is a very narrow one. It is really this, that when that discussion has taken place in a wages board, are the members of that board, if they so desire, to be in a position to report what they think about the subject through the Commission to a Government Department? Is that Department bound to pay attention to what they say? That is really the point at issue. Surely once we realise that the members of these boards will discuss these matters, it is not very reasonable to say that they shall not be allowed to put their opinions on them before the proper quarter. It is only an expression of opinion. They are not to be given any legislative power, no power to issue regulations. They are to be given the opportunity to express their opinion on these questions through the Commission to the Government Department affected. It seems to me that, as the Minister said, it is not merely whether they will do this; it is very desirable they should discuss things themselves, and if they discuss them, it seems to me obviously foolish that we should deprive ourselves of the benefit of knowing what they think about them.

Mr. Montague: I intervene merely for the purpose of putting in Order a repudiation of the statement made by the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams). I do not intend to take any further part in the discussion of this Clause. The hon. Member left to the Committee the impression that he had been explicity asked by the Parliamentary Committee of the L.C.C. to support this Amendment. That statement is not correct. The hon. Member was not asked by the Parliamentary Committee. He made a great to-do about that Committee being one which had a majority of Socialists, which would have been a point of substance if the statement he made had been correct. The letter had nothing to do with this Amendment, except so far as


the hon. Member himself likes to imagine, or to suggest, that it had. It referred to another Amendment entirely, and the impression left by the hon. Member is entirely incorrect.

Sir H. Williams: I take it that you will permit me, Mr. Williams, to deal with the matter. I am sorry there has been so much heat and so much misapprehension. If hon. Members will read page 161 of the Amendments, they will find there a new Clause in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir J. Lamb). That has the support of all the local government authorities, because they want to make sure, beyond any conceivable doubt, that the evil shall not arise.

The Deputy-Chairman (Mr. Charles Williams): We must leave the new Clause until we come to it.

Sir H. Williams: I only want to refer to it in reference to the question of misstatement. The particular communication in the letter had direct reference to the new Clause. I approached the hon. Member for Stone and said I wanted to make sure that this Amendment was in part related to the new Clause. He was kind enough to let me have the note, and I satisfied myself that there was a relation between the two matters. Therefore, there was no misstatement.

Mr. Colegate: I cannot agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis) that this is a narrow matter. Frankly, the words which it is proposed to leave out are a stumbling block to many of us who are in general agreement with the objects of the Bill. I was associated years ago with someone well known to Members of this House, Mr. Mallon, in the anti-sweating movement; I subscribed to the funds of his campaign, and I have been associated a great deal with the sort of thing that the Minister has at heart in putting forward this Bill. But I hope that hon. Members will try to realise what is the point worrying so many of us. Many of the speeches I have heard on this Clause, particularly that of my hon. Friend the Member for Streatham (Mr. Robertson), dealt with things which are wholly within the sphere of the Commissioners under the words:
affecting the remuneration, conditions of employment, health or welfare of all or any of the workers…

When he spoke of workers working in particularly difficult conditions—he mentioned Soho—I had the greatest sympathy with him, and so, I think, did all hon. Members. There is nothing that any hon. Member would not do to secure the abolition of such conditions. But can people really say that those conditions cannot be dealt with if we leave out the words:
affecting the efficiency and development,
etc., and leave in the words:
affecting the remuneration, conditions of employment, health or welfare…
A Commissioner who, in view of those words, failed to deal with conditions such as we have heard of would be guilty of serious breach of duty. Many of us strongly believe in private enterprise. We believe that after this war if we are to have the things we want, such as the Beveridge Report—and I voted against the Government on the question of a Minister of Social Security—we have to bring about a great expansion of private industry. I think it is the duty of the Government to assist that expansion in every way they can.

The Deputy-Chairman: I do not think it would be fair to the Committee if I allowed one hon. Gentleman to begin a discussion of private enterprise. I should have to allow others to continue the discussion.

Mr. Colegate: I am sorry. I should have confined my remarks to the question of the efficiency and development of this industry—no doubt very different things. But many of us believe that if we are to have efficiency and development of industry we cannot tuck the matter away in a side drawer of a Measure which deals with something else. This Bill deals with the remuneration and conditions in the catering industry. If we are to put in some of these matters, which we regard as most important, of post-war development at the tag-end of matters of this kind we are doing a very great disservice to them. If you put in here a Clause about the efficiency and development of industry, you give the impression that that is not the primary object of this Clause. Indeed, the Solicitor-General said that it was not; he said that it was a secondary object. I do not want it to be a secondary object, If we are going to deal with efficiency and development of industry, let us have a


special Measure. I am going to put a Motion on the Order Paper about the Board of Trade and their function in regard to the efficiency and development of industry.

The Deputy-Chairman: The hon. Member is really extending his remarks on this subject very widely.

Mr. Colegate: If we can have these words taken out of the Bill, the objection which many of us feel to the Bill will be almost entirely removed, subject to any consequential Amendments that may be moved. I ask the Minister to agree to the removal of these words, and he will then find that many of us who have spoken on these Amendments will be helpful to him in getting the Bill through.

Mr. Bevin: I cannot accept the position that a workman sitting on the board can be only a hewer of wood and a drawer of water. I really cannot accept that position.

Mr. Colegate: We are not asking the right hon. Gentleman to accept that. That is quite a different matter.

Mr. Bevin: I suggest that the whole tenour of this Debate is that the wages board shall deal only with wages, health and welfare. That is what you want me to say. I really cannot accept that. I stand my ground on the Motion that this House passed in 1917, and I cannot go back on the Whitley Committee Report that this House then accepted. The Report said:
to secure the largest possible measure of joint action between employers and workpeople for the development of the industry as a part of the national life.
[An HON. MEMBER: "Does not that refer to the Whitley councils?"] These boards are, in industries where no machinery exists, a substitute, but I hope an effective substitute, for joint industrial councils. If they are not that, they are not worth establishing. I must give to these people who have to operate these wages boards the same right of expression as they would have if they were in a strongly organised union. I have been charged with doing this to try and increase trade unions. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for Chorley (Sir D. Hacking) raised this point yesterday and said that many of my friends in the trade unions have opposed

legal regulation. I am not even one of them. I have always taken the generous view that it is the duty of the man in the union who is strong enough to defend himself to use his power and influence to provide machinery for the benefit of men and women who are incapable of defending themselves. I stand on that. [An HON. MEMBER: "It is that that we are asking."] Then we are in agreement. I am not unconciliatory, but I cannot conciliate on a vital principle. It was said earlier in the discussions that I was interfering with individual management, and no one has substantiated that or argued it except my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley (Mr. C. Lloyd).
I have made the position perfectly clear. I happen to be a member too of the wages board of the steel trade. My hon. Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Summers) will remember that, with good friends in his trade, I helped to found the board in his trade at the end of the last war. Let me tell my hon. Friends that within 12 months of fixing the Galvanising Trade Conciliation Board—and this board deals with efficiency and development—we were compelled to meet the Government representative through the whole deflation period in order to restore our foreign trade. Can my hon. Friend the Member for Dudley deny that on his own wages board we discussed questions of tariffs in order to make representations to this House? All these questions have been discussed on wages boards, and I do not want to deny—and that is all for which I am asking—the opportunity of the wages board for this industry to discuss their economic problems. It can be said that on the recently established wages board as a result of the Lord Greene Committee—and it has been approved by the Government, and the board is parallel with this—they are going to discuss every problem almost of the mining industry. I only say that I put these words into this Bill—perhaps I made them too short—to try and express that which is observed in nearly every industry in this country. I tried to find just two words which would give to the board an opportunity to discuss these problems and report and give the industry or the Government the benefit of their knowledge.
As it created a kind of fear that the word "efficiency" might open out a door, which I did not intend, I accepted the word "improvement." To ask either


now or at a later stage that I should deprive both sides on these boards of an opportunity of discussing things vital to their own material interest and for the development of their industry and their well-being and of getting the proper results of their efforts is to ask for something to which I cannot agree.

Flight-Lieutenant Raikes: I have waited for some time to find an Amendment which I could reasonably support. In spite of what the right hon. Gentleman the Minister has said, I still consider that this Amendment would be of advantage to this Measure, and I propose to give my reasons. The right hon. Gentleman referred to Whitley Councils and to machinery for joint action for improvement in industry, and there is no Member of this Committee who is not in favour of that. But that is not the whole of the case. Because you may be in favour of machinery for joint action, it does not mean that it is advisable to use a wages board, except primarily, as in this case, for dealing with wages, or that that same board is the type of board which can usually be improved, in dealing with that which requires great skill—the development and conduct of industry. I can understand the need for setting up powers to deal primarily with the development of industry as such, which is an entirely different matter, but to bring in the development and improvement of industry by the back door, as a secondary part of a board's duty, is an entirely wrong method of dealing with the matter, and if this Amendment is divided upon—and I hope it will be—I shall support it.

Sir L. Lyle: I feel that this is the most important Clause in the whole of the Bill, and it has been shown to me, as I have always regarded it, that there is a very great point of principle underlying it. I am afraid that I for one have not been convinced by what the Minister has said. He has told us many times that he does not mean certain things and that it is not his intention to use the words proposed in their literal sense, and that he has no intention of trying to interfere with the management of an individual company. I know that his word is as good as his bond, and I accept what he says with regard to this Measure, but that is not the point which has been made all the way through on various other Amendments.

You have to go by what is in the Bill when it becomes an Act. It is on the words of the Act of Parliament that the Judges of the High Court base their decisions. All we know here is that the right hon. Gentleman is giving these committees the power to go into the question of efficiency and development. It is said to me that their power is very limited because they cannot do anything. They report, but their power of recommendation is very great. It is said also that when they report there is no power in the Bill to do anything about it. That is ridiculous. If the Government can do nothing about it when they have reported, why bring this within the Bill at all? There is a very great principle involved here. Without being offensive to hon. Members opposite, I must say that I think this is the first round of the great question whether business should be run by private enterprise or by the State——

The Deputy-Chairman: The hon. Member cannot go into that question now.

Sir L. Lyle: With the greatest respect, Mr. Williams, I have drawn my conclusions from these words as to what I think the dangers are. We are discussing the Bill, which deals with wages, hours and conditions. We thought that this was wrong at the time; perhaps we were wrong, and perhaps the Minister was right, but at any rate we have the genuine fear that efficiency and development may be handicapped by, say, a future House of Commons and perhaps another Minister. It is making a start with State interference of private enterprise, and we feel we are justified in resisting. I do not think the Minister has met all the points that were made, and I hope my hon. Friends will persist in their opposition.

Viscountess Astor: I do not want to detain the Committee for more than a few moments, but the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Bourne-mouth (Sir L. Lyle) has brought me to my feet. He thinks private enterprise will be endangered by this Bill. Has he forgotten what happened in 1917? I remember that my husband made a speech in this House that year about these wages boards and warning industry that it had better prepare for reconstruction after the war. As one who has watched industry all this time from a social and moral point


of view, I do not believe there is too much we can say about what wages boards have done. I am a believer in private enterprise, but if private enterprise is frightened of this Bill, it is doomed. I do not believe that some of the opponents of this Bill are as frightened as my hon. Friend of the future. I do not say that all opponents are fighting from the same point of view, but there is one point of view—the old die-hard Tory point of view—that does not want to change anything. There is only one point of view more dangerous than that, and that is the extreme left point of view.

The Deputy-Chairman: Would the Noble Lady mind keeping off points of view that might be dangerous, otherwise she might raise a little heat?

Viscountess Astor: The last thing in the world I want to do is to raise heat, but I think the Minister has been extraordinarily conciliatory. I do not always back him, but I think we who have been interested in trying to get trade boards in the catering industry could have been subjected to a smashing attack by the Minister, if he had so desired. But he has not done it. I could have given him ammunition which would have made some Members thoroughly ashamed of their point of view. I hope that my hon. Friends will not vote against this Amendment. If they do they will be putting themselves into a foolish position.

Mr. Cyril Lloyd: Is the Noble Lady in Order in talking of trade boards when they are not before the Committee?

The Deputy-Chairman: The last thing I heard was the Noble Lady giving advice as to how to vote on this Amendment, and that seemed to me to be largely in Order.

Viscountess Astor: One of the points the Minister made was of importance. He pointed out that you cannot put workers on these boards. All over the country people are watching the House of Commons to see whether workers will get the same privileges as they have had during the war. These privileges have not led to failure. Remember the steel trade and Sir Arthur Pugh, one of the most valuable men England has ever possessed. The steel trade considered tariffs and every sort of question and was a

success. One hon. Member said that the board would have power to make recommendations. Does he not want them to recommend the best for their trade? In doing that, they would be recommending what is best for the country. As a stout believer in private enterprise, I can say that it will be greatly endangered if hon. Members look backward and are frightened of looking forward.

Sir Frank Sanderson: I have listened to the whole of the Debate on this Amendment, and I must confess that I cannot make up my mind whether Members are making a debating point or whether they expect and anticipate that the Minister will make a concession. My hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth (Sir L. Lyle) has just said that the Bill deals with hours, wages and conditions, but if that was the beginning and ending of this Clause, why does he not take exception to the words "conditions of employment, health or welfare"? These words are quite outside the purview of wages and hours. My hon. Friend takes no exception to these words. Will anyone suggest that conditions of employment, health or welfare are part of wages?

Mr. Colegate: These questions are always fully dealt with when modern wages agreements are discussed.

Sir F. Sanderson: I should be happy to accept that view with the proviso that if we accept the view that a wages board should include conditions of employment, health or welfare, why does my hon. Friend take exception to the words:
affecting the efficiency and development of that part of the industry in relation to which the board operates"?
To my mind it is part and parcel of the same thing, and I cannot help thinking that this is a debating point rather than a real difference of opinion.

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: Will the Minister tell us why he gives these powers to the wages board, which is dealing with only a section of the industry, and withholds it from the Commission as a whole, which is considering the industry as a whole? In other words, why does he put it into Clause 6 instead of Clause I?

Mr. Bevin: If I had put it into Clause 1, all the opposition that has been offered to the point would be valid since the Commission would have been given power to-


roam over the whole industry. Therefore I put it into Clause 6, in order that it should be given not to the independent Commission but to the employers and workpeople on the wages board who would have the right to discuss the problems of their own section of the industry.

Mr. Summers: I should like to mention one or two reasons which I have not heard mentioned yet which to my mind justify the inclusion of the words "efficiency and development," or some such words, in the Clause. Anyone listening to the Debate would, I think, find himself somewhat confused at the disparity in the arguments used by supporters of the Amendment. On the one hand, we have those who moved it on the ground that it is putting undesirable powers into the hands of the Commission and the wages board and, on the other hand, the hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Colegate) says it is not doing proper justice to this task, namely, the improvement of the industry, to tack it on to the end of a piece of machinery which is properly dealing with wages. I have felt it difficult to agree whole-heartedly with the Minister's point of view, because the Board of Trade is logically the right Department of the State to handle the development of industry, and, that being so, it appears at first sight somewhat illogical to give to the Ministry of Labour a task outside that which it is normally set up to undertake. If, however, the other point of view is taken and some machinery is set up to enable the Board of Trade to discharge the task which logically falls to it, and it is desired to do that, the dilemma at once arises that there will be two pieces of machinery, one dealing with wages, conditions and welfare and the other with the improvement and development of the industry. The hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) suggested that the personnel who might be expected to comprise the wages board would not be competent to deal with such matters as the improvement and development of the industry. If it is to do justice to its task in dealing with wages, it is essential that it should have representatives who are competent to deal not only with wages but with the general conditions of the industry as well. If they are not capable of fulfilling the dual function, they are not satisfactory representatives to deal with the single function, and on this ground I

dismiss as unconvincing the notion that the dual task cannot be carried out by the Wages Board.
The Minister mentioned the part that he played in the formation of the Galvanising Conciliation Board, and he mentioned my name. From such knowledge as I have of the working of that piece of conciliation machinery, it is clear that, ancillary to the proper working of that board, there is discussion on matters affecting the general improvement and development of industry. As far as I am aware, it is not resented in any way by the people who comprise that board, and on this ground it would seem to me an unnecessary restriction of the time and activities of the people who are devoting themselves to this task to say, "You shall be debarred from having a channel through which your views on the future of the industry shall be brought to the notice of people in a position to do something about it."
There is another reason which on broad grounds seems to me to support the idea of having a dual function for the wages board. Trade unions in an industry where no outside machinery to fulfil their normal tasks exists have an opportunity, through the contacts that they have with the management, for considering, it may be tariffs, it may be new plant, it may be the movement of industry or matters affecting the general interest of the trade upon which in the last resort the wages that can be paid rest, and therefore it seems quite wrong to discuss in vacuo what is proper to be paid without any regard to the steps that might require to be taken to enable the industry itself to support the conditions recommended by these bodies. [Interruption.] I do not think the Committee would wish me to digress into what the hon. Member would regard as the machinations of the steel industry. I am prepared at any other time to defend the working of that industry to my heart's content, but I do not think it has much relevance to Clause 6 of this Bill. I would ask that the long-term view should be borne in mind, to give the representatives of the workers in the industry an opportunity of bringing their knowledge, their hopes, their desires concerning the welfare of the industry as a whole into contact with the employers, so that each may have a better understanding of the point of view


of the other and, by consultation and discussion, remove that barrier between the two sides which in the past has tended to be far more rigidly enforced than many of us feel to be desirable at present. I do not see why those dual functions of the board should become reversed from what is intended—wages development primarily and the general trade discussion secondarily. So long as that relative position is preserved, I see no reason why the second function should not be a useful and practical part which

Division No. 14.
AYES.



Adamson, Jennie L. (Dartford)
Fyfe, Major Sir D. P. M.
Mander, G. Ie M.


Adamson, W. M. (Cannock)
Gallacher, W.
Marshall, F.


Albery, Sir Irving
Gardner, B. W.
Martin, J. H.


Ammon, C. G.
Gates, Major E. E.
Mathers, G


Anderson, F. (Whitehaven)
George, Maj. Rt. Hon. G. Lloyd (P'broke)
Mayhew, Lt.-Col. J.


Aske, Sir R. W.
Gibbins, J.
Molson, A. H. E.


Astor, Visc'tess (Plymouth, Sutton)
Goldie, N. B.
Montague, F.


Astor, Hon. W. W. (Fulham, E.)
Green, W. H. (Deptford)
Moore, Lieut.-Col. Sir T. C. R.


Attlee, Rt. Hon. C. R.
Greenwood, Rt. Hon. A.
Morgan, R. H. (Stourbridge)


Barr, J.
Grenfell, D. R.
Morrison, R. C. (Tottenham N.)


Barstow, P. G.
Griffiths, J. (Llanelly)
Morrison, Rt. Hon. W. S. (Cirencester)


Bartlett, C. V. O.
Grimston, R. V.
Muff, G.


Beamish, Rear-Admiral T. P.
Groves, T. E.
Murray, J. D. (Spennymoor)


Beattie, F. (Cathcart)
Gunston, Major Sir D. W.
Nicholson, Captain G. (Farnham)


Beaumont, Hubert (Batley)
Guy, W. H.
Oldfield, W. H.


Beaumont, Maj. Hn. R. E. B. (P'tsm'h)
Hammersley, S. S.
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir H.


Beech man, N. A.
Hannah, I. C.
Paling, W.


Bellenger, F. J.
Hardie, Agnes
Parker, J.


Benson, G.
Harris, Rt. Hon. Sir P. A.
Pearson, A.


Bevin, Rt. Hon. E.
Harvey, T. E.
Pownall, Lt.-Col. Sir Assheton


Bird, Sir R. B.
Henderson, J. (Ardwick)
Price, M. P.


Boulton, W. W.
Henderson, T. (Tradeston)
Quibell, D. J. K.


Bower, Norman (Harrow)
Higgs, W. F.
Reakes, G. L. (Wallasey)


Bowles, F. G.
Hill, Prof. A. V.
Reid, Capt. A. Cunningham (St. M.)


Broad, F. A.
Hinchingbrooke, Viscount
Reid, W. Allan (Derby)


Brocklebank, Sir C. E. R.
Hogg, Hon. Q. McG.
Ridley, G.


Brooke, H. (Lewisham)
Hollins, A. (Hanley)
Robertson, D. (Streatham)


Brown, T. J. (Ince)
Hollins, J. H. (Silvertown)
Salt, E. W.


Buchanan, G.
Horabin, T. L.
Salter, Dr. A. (Bermondsey, W.)


Bullock, Capt. M.
Hurd, Sir P. A.
Sanderson, Sir F. B.


Burden, T. W.
Hutchinson, G. C. (Ilford))
Shepperson, Sir E. W.


Burke, W. A.
Hutchison, Lt.-Com. G. I. C. (E'burgh)
Silkin, L.


Butler, Rt. Hon. R. A.
Jenkins, A. (Pontypool)
Silverman, S. S.


Campbell, Sir E. T. (Bromley)
John, W.
Smith, E. (Stoke)


Cape, T.
Johnston, Rt. Hon. T. (St'l'g &amp; C'km'n)
Smith, E. P. (Ashford)


Cary, R. A.
Jones, A. C. (Shipley)
Smith, T. (Normanton)


Chapman, Sir S. (Edinburgh, S.)
Keir, Mrs. Cazalet
Sorensen, R. W.


Charleton, H. C.
Kendall, W. D.
Spearman, A. C. M.


Cluse, W. S.
Kennedy, Rt. Hon. T.
Stewart, J. Henderson (Fife, E.)


Clynes, Rt. Hon. J. R.
Key, C. W.
Storey, S.


Cocks, F. S.
Kirby, B. V.
Strauss, H. G. (Norwich)


Colindridge, F.
Kirkwood, D.
Stuart, Rt. Hon. J. (Moray &amp; Nairn)


Cove, W. G.
Law, Rt. Hon. R. K.
Summers, G. S.


Culverwell, C. T.
Lawson, J. J.
Sutcliffe, H.


Davidson, J. J. (Maryhill)
Leach, W.
Taylor, R. J. (Morpeth)


Davies, R. J. (Westhoughton)
Leslie, J. R.
Thomas, I. (Keighley)


De Chair. Capt. S. S.
Lewis, O.
Thorne, W.


Denman, Hon. R. D.
Linstead, H. N.
Thorneycroft, H. (Clayton)


Dobbie, W.
Lipson, D. L.
Tomlinson, G.


Douglas, F. C. R.
Little, Dr. J. (Down)
Turton, R. H.


Driberg, T. E. N.
Lucas, Major Sir J. M.
Viant, S. P.


Duckworth, Arthur (Shrewsbury)
McCorquodale, Malcolm S.
Walkden, A. G. (Bristol, S.)


Dugdale, John (W. Bromwhich)
McEntee, V. La T.
Walkden, E. (Doncaster)


Dunn, E.
McEwan, Capt. J. H. F.
Walker, J.


Edmondson, Major Sir J.
McGhee, H. G.
Ward, Col. Sir A. L. (Hull)


Edwards, Walter J. (Whitechapel)
Mack, J. D.
Ward, Irene M. B. (Wallsend)


Etherton, Ralph
McKle, J. H.
Watson, W. McL.


Foot, D. M.
MacLaren, A.
Wedderburn, H. J. S.


Foster, W.
Maclean, N. (Govan)
Welsh, J. C.


Frankel, D.
Magnay, T.
Whiteley, Rt. Hon. W. (Blaydon)


Fraser, T. (Hamilton)
Maitland, Sir A.
Wickham, Lt.-Col. E. T. R.


Fremantle, Sir F. E.
Makins, Brig.-Gen. Sir E.
Williams, E. J. (Ogmore)

the people engaged on the wages board could fulfil.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Stuart): The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Stuart) rose in his place, and claimed to move, "That the Question be now put."

Question, "That the Question be now put," put, and agreed to.

Question put accordingly, "That the words 'or affecting the' stand part of the Clause."

The Committee divided: Ayes, 193; Noes, 42.

Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley)
Wootton-Davies, J. H.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—


Windsor, W.
York, Major C.
Mr. J. P. L. Thomas and Mr. Pym.


Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl
Young, A. S. L. (Partick)



Woodburn, A.
Young, Sir R. (Newton)





NOES.


Acland-Troyte, Lt.-Col. G. J.
Fox, Flight-Lieut. Sir G. W. G.
Procter, Major H. A.


Blair, Sir R.
Furness, Major S. N.
Radford, E. A.


Bossom, A. C.
Gower, Sir R. V.
Raikes, Flight-Lieut. H. V. A. M.


Bower, Comdr. R. T. (Cleveland)
Hacking, Rt. Hon. Sir D. H.
Smithers, Sir W.


Brown, Brig.-Gen. H. C. (Newbury)
Hannon, Sir P. J. H.
Sykes, Maj.-Gen. Rt. Hon. Sir F. H.


Bull, B. B.
Hely-Hutchinson, M. R.
Thomas, Dr. W. S. Russell (S'th'm'tn)


Burghley, Lord
Henderson, J. J. Craik (Leeds, N. E.)
Touche, G. C.


Colegate, W. A.
Hopkinson, A.
Watt, F. C. (Edinburgh, Cen.)


Craven-Ellis, W.
Kimball, Major L.
Wayland, Sir W. A.


Davison, Sir W. H.
Levy, T.
Webbe, Sir W. Harold


Doland, G. F.
Loftus, P. C.
Wells, Sir S. Richard


Dower, Lt.-Col. A. V. G.
Lyle, Sir C. E. Leonard
Williams, Sir H. G. (Croydon, S.)


Elliston, Captain G. S.
Macdonald, Captain Peter (I. of W.)



Emery, J. F.
Peters, Dr. S. J.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Emmott, C. E. G. C.
Petherick, Major M.
Mr. C. Lloyd and Sir Joseph




Lamb.

Amendment made: In page 5, line 7, after "the," insert "general."—[Mr. Bevin.]

Mr. Robertson: I beg to move, in page 5, line 7, to leave out "efficiency," and to insert "improvement."

Mr. Bevin: I am quite prepared to accept the word "improvement."

Sir H. Williams: Surely we ought to have a word of explanation from the hon. Member who has moved the Amendment. [HON. MEMBERS: "Agreed."] In the mind of the hon. Member there is obviously some difference between the significance of "improvement" and "efficiency." Though certain hon. Members are not anxious that Bills should be discussed, it is not unreasonable to ask the hon. Member the meaning of his Amendment.

Mr. Robertson: I am very pleased to satisfy my hon. Friend. It seems to me there is a considerable difference in the meaning of these two English words, and I think that efficiency was an ill-chosen word. It might well be resented by many member's of the catering trade who support this Bill, and they include very large firms indeed. One would imagine in listening to the Debate that the catering trade is against the Bill. I know of no one in the catering trade who is against paying fair wages and giving good conditions. I feel that the word "improvement" is the better word, because all that we have heard from the Minister indicates that what he has in mind is the general improvement of the whole industry, or sections of the industry, and no one who knows anything about the industry can

deny that improvement is very badly wanted. I do not want to take up time, but if my hon. Friend would like a further explanation I could keep the Committee going for several hours.

Sir H. Williams: Having regard to the fact that the hon. Member has now convinced the hon. Members behind him that the Amendment is one they can safely vote for I should like to announce that I support it also.

Amendment agreed to.

Further Amendments made:

In page 5, line 8, at the end, insert "and may submit a report thereon,"

In line 9, leave out "recommendation," and insert "report."

In line 11, leave out "recommendation," and insert "report."—[Mr. McCorquodale.]

Sir H. Williams: I beg to move, in page 5, line 12, to leave out "government department concerned," and to insert "Minister."
This Amendment raises a point of substance. At the moment the Minister is responsible for the general administration of this Bill, and I should have thought that, in accordance with the usual practice, if that involves communications with other Departments of State, the Minister and not this Commission should deal with the other Ministers affected. Constitutionally the Amendment raises a point of some substance, and I hope the Minister will just explain why this somewhat unusual procedure is adopted here.

Mr. McCorquodale: We had a long Debate on this subject on Clause 2, and I do not think it would be right to repeat every argument for the sake of the hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams), who was not able to be here.

Amendment negatived.

Amendments made:

In page 5, line 14, leave out "recommendation," and insert "report."

In line 16, leave out "recommendadation," and insert "report."—[Mr. McCorquodale.]

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

Captain Cunningham-Reid: Under this Clause any wages board will have the power to consider conditions of employment, such as the making of provision for employees of long service who have to retire through no fault of their own. When a board considers conditions of employment it should most certainly take into account the desirability of having superannuation schemes in certain circumstances. I think the Committee will agree that it is desirable to avoid a repetition of some present day conditions, where an employee can render valuable service in the same firm for most of his working life only to find himself up against it when he is too old to carry on.
Such a state of affairs is more frequent than is generally known, and it is to be found in the most unlikely quarters. Let me give one example. A constituent of mine, aged 76, after 36 years' service in a luxury hotel was dismissed with a week's notice on the ground that he had been there too long. If his services had to be dispensed with because he was too old, that is to some extent understandable, but what is not understandable is that after 36 years' faithful service he was given no bonus and no pension, not even a letter of thanks. The shock of his treatment has made him ill. But this poor old man cannot afford to be ill. The hotel to which I am referring is the Ritz Hotel, London. When this matter was brought to my notice my first act was to try to find out whether there was another side to the question. So, two months ago, I wrote to the chairman of the Board of the Ritz Hotel. Since then seven letters have passed between us but no reason has yet

been given why this constituent of mine has been treated in this mean manner. If there was good reason for so doing, why was I not told?

Sir Stanley Reed: On a point of Order. Has the correspondence between the hon. and gallant Member and the hotel manager anything to do with the question before the Committee?

The Chairman (Major Milner): I must ask the hon. and gallant Member to indicate in what way his remarks are related to the Question, "That the Clause stand part of the Bill."

Captain Cunningham-Reid: In my opening remarks, during which Major Milner, I believe, you happened to be talking, I explained the way in which they were connected.

Mr. Kirkwood: Is not the hon. and gallant Member showing the need for the Clause?

Captain Cunningham-Reid: Yes, of course, that is the case. I am coming to that point in a moment. I am now trying to give an explanation to the Chairman. One of the main considerations in Clause 6 is the conditions of employment. The Minister said in his remarks to-day, that the wages board cannot be limited in the scope of its reports to the benefit of those that come under this Bill. I consequently hope that the board will consider the desirability in certain cases of instituting superannuation schemes to look after old employees. Therefore, I feel that I am justified in giving an example of why it is so necessary that this should be done in the future. If there had been some good reason for this man being dismissed there was no reason why the director of the Ritz Hotel could not tell me, even verbally, but it was not done.

Lieut.-Colonel Sir Thomas Moore: On a point of Order. Can it be made clear whether indication was previously given to the chairman of the Ritz Hotel, who is well known to be a Member of this House, that this point was to be raised so that he could be in his place to answer the charge and give the other side of the picture?

Captain Cunningham-Reid: I purposely had not mentioned that the chairman of the Ritz Hotel is a Member of this House,


but as it has now been mentioned, it is only right that I should give the answer. This is the final letter which I wrote to the hon. Member for Dulwich (Mr. Bracewell Smith).

The Chairman: The hon. and gallant Member is not entitled to read the letter. It is going far beyond the scope of the question. He is only entitled to give an illustration.

Major Petherick: An attack has been made upon a Member of this House in the guise of criticism of a chairman of a public company, without the hon. Member in question having an opportunity of reply. What can be done in such circumstances, Major Milner, when an allegation has been made against an hon. Member in his absence to enable a reply to be given?

The Chairman: No doubt, if necessary, the hon. Member concerned will find an opportunity to make a reply.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: I was not going to proceed with my reply, but now that you have given me that opportunity, Major Milner, I will——

The Chairman: The opportunity to which I referred was such as might be available to the hon. Gentleman to whom I understand the hon. and gallant Member is making reference, and not to the hon. and gallant Gentleman himself.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: I beg your pardon, Major Milner. I hope you will allow me to say that of course I gave notice to the hon. Gentleman in question that I was raising this matter on this occasion, and I sent it by registered letter. [An HON. MEMBER: "That settles that."] It is suggested that in raising this matter I am doing something wrong and am attacking an hon. Member of this House, but I am doing nothing of the kind; I am looking after the interests of one of my constituents, as it is my duty to do. It so happens that the matter coincides with what we are discussing today, and therefore I thought it only right and proper that, as this is an example of what we want to avoid in the future I should bring it up on this occasion. I do not desire to pursue this matter, but I should have liked, now that the name of the hon. Member has been brought up, in fairness to him, to divulge some of the correspondence, but I gather from you,

Major Milner, that that would be going too far. Perhaps you will allow me to say this, that during all these intervening eight weeks, while seven letters have passed between us, on no occasion has the reason been given why the man was treated in this manner.

The Chairman: The present remarks of the hon. and gallant Gentleman have no relation to the question before the Committee.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: As I have ventilated this man's grievance and at the same time shown the necessity for reform I feel satisfied as far as that is concerned. My only regret is that the hon. Member to whom I sent notice did not feel inclined to come along here to-day and give some answer.

Mr. Craik Henderson: When we discussed Clause I it was made clear that the Commission were to have no right to deal with questions of efficiency and development, but, under some of the Subsections of Clause 6, where a wages board make a report, the Commission will have to consider the report and submit it, with such observations as they think fit. Therefore, under the Clause, when a wages board make a report upon the improvement or development of an industry, the report will be submitted to the Commission, which may then send forward their views upon the development of the industry, too. Would it not have been better for the Commission not to have anything to do with this part at all? I think the intention was that the Commission was not to deal with development or improvement at all and for that to be kept entirely for the wages board.

Major Petherick: I did not want to talk on this question unless the hon. and gallant Member for St. Marylebone (Captain Cunningham-Reid) had raised it, as he did in relation to an hon. Member of this House. I may find it difficult to keep in Order, but I will do my best. The hon. and gallant Member raised the point in relation to the improvement of conditions in the industry, and I understand the suggestion was that an example was given of bad conditions which would be remedied. He gave that example in relation to a company of which my hon. Friend who was attacked is chairman. My hon. Friend told me last night that he had received the letter in relation to this


man of 76 who had been dismissed. I do not know what the reason was. I did not ask him. It may have been a good case on the part of the company or a bad case on the part of the company. He did tell me he had received a letter from the hon. and gallant Member for St. Marylebone (Captain Cunningham-Reid), in which he said that unless the man was taken back he would raise the matter on the Floor of the House. I say that merely for the protection of my hon. Friend who is not here.

Captain Cunningham-Reid: A serious allegation has been made. I feel sure I shall be allowed to make a response to it, which I can do in just a few words. It amounts to this: In the first place, I have never recently spoken to the hon. Member for Dulwich (Mr. Bracewell Smith), and, secondly, in the letter referred to I never made any such suggestion as has been imputed.

Mr. Bevin: In reply to the point made, Sub-sections (4) and (5) should be taken together, in order to see what the real object is in referring a recommendation to the Commission. These boards will be a series of boards covering a wide range of services. The recommendations of one may impinge on those of another, and it is a convenient means of machinery that in those circumstances they can be referred to the Commission, who can make their observations thereon.

Question, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill," put, and agreed to.

CLAUSE 7.—(Power to fix remuneration and holidays.)

Major Petherick: I beg to move, in page 5, line 26, to leave out "Minister," and to insert "Commission."
We have just been discussing the general provisions regarding wages boards. We now come to a Clause giving certain specific powers and duties to the wages boards which are shown in the Bill as, "wages regulation proposals"—fixing remuneration, holidays, intervals for meals or rest, and so on. These recommendations, or rather the "wages regulation proposals," are to be sent, not to the Commission but direct to the Minister, and some of us put down this Amendment with a view to discovering why this was.

It is a curious halma kind of move to go over the heads of the Commission direct to the Minister. Under the Bill as it stands the Commission has been entrusted with general duties of supervision and making recommendations on wages and conditions in the industry. Therefore, it seems rather peculiar that when, as a result of some of their recommendations, wages boards are set up, the reports of these boards should not be sent to the Commission at all but direct to the Minister. There may be some reason for that, but what it is I have not yet been able to understand. The Commission may not, in fact, agree with the wages regulation proposals sent forward, but they will not see them, I suppose, until some later stage. I think that the Commission should be given the opportunity, first of receiving these wages regulation proposals, and then of sending them on to the Minister, together with any comments they may see fit to make. It seems to me that that point is quite a reasonable suggestion. I put it forward to my right hon. Friend. There are one or two consequential Amendments. I do not mention them now and I would be out of Order if I did. I ask the Minister whether he would consider this matter.

Mr. Bevin: I have followed precisely in this case the procedure of the Road Haulage Board, trade boards and other forms of wage regulation. There is another reason why the proposals should come direct to the Minister. If you look at the powers of the Commission, at no place are they charged with the duty of fixing wages, and it would be quite wrong to convert the Commission into a sort of super-arbitration court presiding over what virtually becomes, under the Bill, a self-governing wages board. Therefore, when a wages board comes to a decision, that decision ought to come to the Minister for consideration and not have superimposed upon it another argument before another body which would convert the Commission into a kind of super-arbitration court and so duplicate the discussion. I think the hon. and gallant Member will see the wisdom of this, and will not press his Amendment.

Lieut.-Colonel Acland-Troyte: The Commission are to consider remuneration. Therefore, why should they not have a report from the wages board?


Is it not quite absurd to set up a Commission and then take proposals direct to the Minister?

Mr. Bevin: There are two different things we have to consider, and one is regulating machinery. Once you have established that, it becomes self-governing and reports direct to the Minister.

Amendment negatived.

Major Petherick: I beg to move, in page 5, line 28, after "the," to insert "minimum."
I have mentioned before that the wages board has power to submit to the Minister proposals for fixing the remuneration to be paid to various employees in the industry, and the Amendment which I now move would have the effect of stating in the Bill—I think it may be the first time it would have appeared—that the proposals they shall make shall fix the minimum remuneration. I can well understand the view of the Government on this point. They will say that a number of other instruments contain proposals for a statutory wage and that they do not mention the word "minimum." It is simply a statutory wage without the word "minimum" in. They will also say that the statutory wage means the minimum wage. I agree with that, but I think most Members on both sides of the House are in favour of getting the highest wages possible paid in industry, and there is a tendency, when a statutory wage is fixed, for it to become a completely fixed wage, and in the ordinary way employers do not pay more than the minimum. I believe that my proposal does not actually add to the Bill. The legal position remains the same, but it does draw the attention of the wages board and of employers to the fact that these wages, when they are subsequently fixed and become statutory wages, are in fact minimum wages; and I think it might obliquely and by implication encourage employers to pay more than the statutory minimum. Therefore I hope my right non. Friend, as the proposal makes no addition, in fact, to the power of the Bill, will consider this Amendment very carefully. I hope he may see fit to accept it.

The Solicitor-General: I sympathise with what is animating my hon. and gallant Friend in putting forward this Amendment, but I hope that I may convince him that the Amendment is not

necessary, in view of the provisions of the Bill. Sub-section (8) of this Clause says:
Remuneration…fixed by a wages regulation order is hereafter in this Act referred to as 'statutory remuneration.'
Clause 8, Sub-section (2)—the penal Subsection, which establishes the sanction—says:
If an employer fails to pay to a worker to whom a wages regulation order applies remuneration not less than the statutory remuneration….
We have there, in the words "not less than," the clear suggestion that this is imposed as a minimum rate, and that the encouragement and tendency are to pay above it. The only other point I would like to make—and I am sure my hon. and gallant Friend will appreciate the importance of it—is that it is true that the word "minimum" was used in legislation up to a number of years ago. It occurs in the Trade Boards Act, but it was omitted in the Road Haulage Act, and it has made no difficulty. It would be rather unfortunate if at this stage, having taken the course of omitting the word, we now went back upon that course, and it would raise a difficulty in connection with the Road Haulage Act.

Mr. Rhys Davies: Under the Trade Boards Acts, there are, I know, cases of employers who pay more than the trade board rates. I would like the Minister to tell us what word is used in the Trade Board Acts. Is it the word "minimum"? I have not given very much thought to this, but in regard to the argument of the hon. and learned Gentleman, it seems to me that these personal service occupations differ fundamentally from industries like road haulage, coalmining and engineering. I would not like to have sat here without saying at any rate that I would prefer some words to indicate that the employer may pay more if he cares to do so under this Measure.

Mr. Craik Henderson: I think we are dealing with something entirely different from road haulage, and practical difficulties might result if the word "minimum" were not inserted. I contemplate a great many difficulties that might arise, and I would ask the learned Solicitor-General to consider this matter before the next stage.

The Solicitor-General: There is no difference between us on this matter: we only


want the best word. I thought that the position was clear, but if there is any doubt, I will gladly consider it again. If any of my hon. Friends want to make any representations, I shall be only too pleased to discuss the matter. Perhaps my hon. and gallant Friend, in view of that undertaking, will not press the Amendment at this stage.

Sir H. Williams: I would like to reinforce what was said by the hon. Member for Westhoughton (Mr. Rhys Davies). This Bill is an extension of the Trade Boards Act. Road haulage is a different thing. Also, the word "statutory" sounds too respectable, if I may put it that way. A man says, "I am paying statutory wages, so I am a good fellow." If he says, "I am paying minimum wages," that sounds quite different. I think you will get better terms of service if you use the word "minimum" than if you use the word "statutory."

Major Petherick: I think that the last point made by my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) is a very good one. Evidently it was originally the right thing to introduce the word "minimum" in such circumstances in Acts of Parliament. The fact that it was dropped does not necessarily mean that it was wisely dropped. I agree that if you suddenly introduced it now, and if there are a great many cases where the word "minimum" was not used in Acts, it might make things a little difficult. It depends on how many Acts it has been used in already, and whether if you go back to the old scheme—which is quite a good thing to do sometimes—it would cast doubt on previous Acts. I do not in the least want to delay the proceedings. I shall be grateful if my hon. and learned Friend will re-examine the matter in the light of what has been said, and, on that understanding, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Sir H. Williams: I beg to move, in page 5, line 34, to leave out paragraph (c).
We have, I am very glad to say, introduced in this country a general system of paid holidays. It is already almost universally in operation, apart from certain seasonal trades. This paragraph tends to throw doubt on existing practices, and I

think that by doing that it does not strengthen but tends to weaken the Bill. Where you put into an Act of Parliament something which is already substantially in operation in practice, and the Act will not come into operation for a long time, you tend rather to prejudice than to improve the position.

Mr. Bevin: This provision follows precisely upon the model of the Holidays with Pay Act, which was carried a few years ago. It does no more than carry out the principle which Parliament approved when they gave power to the Agricultural wages committees and the Road Haulage Board to fix holidays. The only way of legalising the holiday without having a general Holidays Act is to give these wages boards power to fix holidays. Parliament decided at that time to adopt this method. I must have it in this Bill so that the same procedure can be followed as that which applies in all other wage-fixing machinery in this country.

Sir H. Williams: I am grateful for that explanation, and I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Craik Henderson: I beg to move, in page 5, line 35, at the end, to insert:
Provided always that no wages regulation proposals shall be submitted in respect of any workers whose wages are regulated under the provisions of any Act other than this Act.
I move this only in order to get some elucidation. Under Clause 7, power is given to introduce wage regulation proposals.

Mr. Bevin: I am sorry to interrupt my hon. Friend. I undertook yesterday, in dealing with the powers of the Commission, to look into this question prior to the Report stage and I thought that, probably, my hon. Friend did not know that.

Mr. Henderson: I did not know that, and in view of what the Minister has said, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendments made:

In page 6, line 11, after "shall," insert:
make such investigations as it thinks fit and shall.

In line 14, leave out "fourteen" and insert "twenty-one."

In line 17, after "and," insert:
shall make such further enquiries as it considers necessary and."—[Mr. Bevin.]

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

CLAUSE 8.—(Effect and enforcement of wages regulation orders.)

Sir H. Williams: I beg to move, in page 7, line 11, after "employer," to insert "wilfully."
This raises a point with which probably the Solicitor-General would wish to deal. There is a difference between inadvertent failure to do something and deliberate failure. It may be that these words do not carry any significance. It is difficult for those who are not trained in the law to appreciate the significance of words inserted in a Clause, but there is all the difference in the world between a deliberate act and an inadvertent act, and I hope that the Solicitor-General will be able to satisfy me that the proposed addition of the word "wilfully" is unnecessary. I wish to make it clear that penalties should follow only where there are deliberate acts.

The Solicitor-General: I want to make it absolutely clear to my hon. Friend that we could not accept the Amendment, not because of any question of drafting but because of the most serious considerations arising from all the industrial legislation of the past century. It is, in our view, essential that this should be an absolute duty on the part of the employer and that failure to carry out the duty should be the subject of penal sanctions. The most obvious case of industrial legislation is the case of the Factory Acts. There, the obligations with regard to machinery or dangerous trades are absolute obligations, and the same applies to many of the regulations under the Coal Mines Acts. That has been essential. I cannot imagine anything that has been of greater value to the worker in industry, than that these have been absolute liabilities. It has been impossible for any employer to say, "This was an inadvertence, I really intended the conditions to be as good as possible but there has been some slight omission." Once we have the view that it is essential—whether they are eventually called minimum wages or statutory wages—that the provision should be obeyed, then it is

essential that there should be this absolute liability upon the employer. There is exactly the same protection for the employer as that given under the Factory Acts. As far as criminal prosecution is concerned, he can come before the court and prove—the onus being upon him—that it was not his fault but the fault of the manager or some agent. This has been found to be quite good in the corresponding Sections of the Factory Acts, but I must make it clear to my hon. Friend that it is a point of policy. We believe absolute liability to be essential and must insist upon it.

Sir H. Williams: I appreciate the point which the learned Solicitor-General has made but the analogy of the Factory Acts is not too good. A factory is generally a large establishment where the employer is, in fact, the managing director, who is there all the time and has a general supervision. In big institutions with which I am not connected, multiple shop institutions, the employers may consist of a board of directors sitting at some central office in London. There may be a case of 500 catering establishments up and down the country and the failure to pay the required wages may be something of which the board of directors have no knowledge, the person who has failed being the manager of the local cafe. There are plenty of cases where there are 100 or more separate catering establishments scattered over wide areas, and the person to be prosecuted will be the person who is innocent of any offence. He will be dragged into court and the penalty will fall upon innocent Mr. "A," while guilty Mr. "B" will not be penalised at all. I think there ought to be some safeguard that those who have in one sense ultimate responsibility should not be penalised for the action of an agent. In other words, the prosecution ought to be directed against the defendant

The Solicitor-General: Would my hon. Friend look at Clause 11 (2)?

Sir H. Williams: Is that the definition of "employer"?

The Solicitor-General: It is the provision by which an employer in the position mentioned by my hon. Friend, can pass on the prosecution to his agent.

Sir H. Williams: In other words, you pass on an unpleasant obligation. If I


have a summons served on me, it puts me under the unpleasant obligation of saying to another person in my employment "You have to answer this charge." In some cases where an employer is actually to blame, an employee, under duress, might take the blame for what was, in fact, his employer's action. The person who has committed the crime ought to be the person charged in the first place. I am not satisfied that Clause 11 (2)—which I admit I had not read until this moment—is the real answer to the Amendment and I hope the Solicitor-General will re-examine the whole problem.

Mr. Leslie: The obligation should be on the employer. We know that in some shops to-day if an assistant inadvertently places the wrong ticket on an article for sale, the employer is prosecuted. I have seen it happen when fruit has been marked "British" instead of "Empire." Under trade boards, there is an obligation to pay the proper rate and prosecution follows if the proper rate is not paid. Why should we insert the word "wilfully" because this happens to be the catering industry, when that word does not apply to other occupations in the country?

Mr. Watt: The general rule in criminal practice, as I understand it, is that no one ought to be punished for any contravention of a Statute unless that contravention is wilful, but for certain reasons, which arise particularly in wartime, we have instances where the mere fact that there is contravention is sufficient. Such cases may be justified on exceptional grounds, but it does not seem to me that in a Statute that will be a peace-time rather than a war-time Measure, we should extend the undesirable practice of making an innocent contravention punishable by fine. There are cases where, for the benefit of the public, an employer may be punished for something he knows nothing about. Take, for instance, the licensing statutes in Scotland, and the case of a servant who serves a drink on a Sunday to somebody whom he believes to be a bona fide traveller but who is not such a traveller. Although in many cases the employer has given strict orders to his servant as to his course of conduct when dealing with visitors on Sundays, that is no protection. The overriding consideration is that the public interest demands

that persons who are not bona fide travellers shall not be served and in order to secure this public interest, this stringent necessity is imposed on the hotel people. While no one will suggest that payment of wages is not a matter of first-class importance it seems to me—and I support the Amendment from this point of view—that all sorts of hardships may arise. You will have people flocking to the courts and presiding judges with different ideas about appropriate sentences. The word "wilful" ought to be inserted. I do not think the worker would lose any protection by it.

Sir F. Sanderson: Is it not a fact that ignorance of the law is no technical or legal excuse for breaking it?

The Solicitor-General: That ignorance would be no excuse, and that absence of wilfulness would be no excuse, as the Bill stands, is the policy for which I stand. I have mentioned the Factory Acts and the Coal Mines Acts. The same policy is shown in the Trade Board Act and the Road Haulage Act. I would like to tell my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams), who is desirous of knowing whether these things are effective or not, that of the two provisions I mentioned one has been in operation under the Factory Acts for a long time. Exactly the same position arises there, because an undertaking may be a long way from headquarters. A similar position exists under the Food and Drugs Act under which, as my hon. Friend will know if he has had any experience as a lay magistrate, or has seen them at work, there have been milk prosecutions. This is not a new-fangled idea; it is a protection which has been found to work fairly and a principle for which we stand.

Sir H. Williams: In view of the Solicitor-General's explanation, I will not press the matter further.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment made: In page 7, line 23, at the end, insert:
on the employer or any other person charged as the actual offender having been found guilty of the offence."—[Mr. Bevin.]

Major Petherick: I beg to move, in page 7, line 25, to leave out "two years" and to insert "twelve months."
Under the Bill as it is drafted, contraventions which go back for two years can


be taken into account in dealing with an employer in a court of law if he does not pay proper wages and I am proposing that one year should be sufficient. The effect of the two-year proposal will be that the prosecution might put a case before a lay bench, which might or might not be well informed, and might thus secure a conviction which, owing to weakness of evidence, they would not otherwise be successful in securing. I think the Bill as it stands is sufficiently severe on an employer who, quite possibly, did not wilfully infringe the obligations under the statutory minimum wage provisions and I hope the Minister or the Solicitor-General will consider whether one year is not sufficient in taking into consideration contraventions under this particular Sub-section.

Mr. McCorquodale: Parliament has always regarded two years as being a reasonable period in cases of this sort. It is two years in the Trade Boards Act, the Road Haulage Wages Act, and the Agricultural Wages Act, and I suggest that it should remain the same in this Measure.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mr. Watt: I beg to move, in page 7, line 34, at the end, to insert:
but where a worker has sought to recover under this subsection any sum for remuneration from an employer against whom proceedings are brought under the last preceding subsection in respect of such an offence as aforesaid he shall not be entitled to claim by civil proceedings against that employer any sum for remuneration in respect of any period preceding the date of such offence.
The Bill gives a new right to the worker for recovery of wages. I think it is only logical that he should make up his mind whether to proceed under the Act or at common law, if a civil remedy is open to him. It is certainly not the intention of my hon. Friends and myself that the workman should be deprived of any remedy for the recovery of wages, but rather that he should take one remedy and that, if he fails, he should not be able to take the other.

The Solicitor-General: If underpayment has accrued, say, for six years, is there any reason why the worker should be entirely deprived of any remedy for the four years' underpayment? I am afraid it is a matter which appeals to one's sense of equity, and, if the thing has been going on and it has not been found out before six years, and then the prosecution can

only go back for two years, it seems extraordinary that the workman should lose his right to claim for back pay. In the vast majority of cases the prosecution would not be brought by the worker personally. I do not think it is within the experience of many of us that workers rush to prosecute their employers. It would be done by the machinery provided by the Act, and that is an additional reason why the worker who has been underpaid for six years should not lose his right to take civil proceedings.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Major Petherick: I beg to move, in page 7, line 38, after "by," to insert "age."
This Sub-section reads:
If as respects any worker employed or desiring to be employed in such circumstances that a wages Regulation Order applies or will apply to him the Wages Board is satisfied that he is affected by infirmity or physical incapacity which renders him incapable of earning the statutory remuneration.
And it goes on to authorise his employment at less than the established minimum wage. At present, when there is such a great shortage of labour, a considerable number of old people are engaged in this trade at fairly good wages in spite of their age. After the war this may not occur. Take the case of an old "boots" in a hotel, perhaps 73 or 74 years old, whom everyone likes and who is kept on possibly not at full wages, but at as much as they can reasonably afford. I believe that man, if perfectly healthy and not in the least infirm, and if he is not physically incapable and can see, hear, walk, and use his hands, could not be employed at less than the minimum wage, and as some employers would not be well enough off to pay him full wages, he would be dismissed. I think the difficulty would be overcome by the insertion of this word "age."

Mr. McCorquodale: I do not think that would be desirable. I do not think you want the idea that people in receipt of the old age pension, because they are old, should therefore be employed at a lower rate of wages. Infirmity or physical incapacity may render a man incapable of earning the statutory minimum, and it is of course possible that age would be perhaps a large contributing factor to the infirmity or physical incapacity, and in that case it would come in, but we must


keep age alone out of being considered as a reason why people should be employed at a lower rate of wages.

Mr. Craik Henderson: I think my hon. Friend has given a fairly satisfactory answer, but would it not be possible to make it permissive, because one can imagine cases where it would be desirable in the interests of both employer and employed to authorise the employment at lower remuneration?

Sir H. Williams: I do not think that the Parliamentary Secretary has met the point, and inadvertently he has misled himself and the Committee, because he implied that infirmity or physical incapacity was affected by age, but all these words are qualified by the further words which are the significant words
which renders him incapable of earning the statutory remuneration.
Age only comes in if that further qualification is fulfilled, and the wages board have to be satisfied. We have only to visualise what will happen some 20 years hence when the number of old age pensioners will be nearly doubled and the number of people of ordinary working age is fewer. This country can only survive in 25 or 30 years' time if people continue working to a much higher age. We want to do all we can to encourage old people whose reason for not being able to earn the full amount is that they are slower. Their minds are all right, and they are not physically incapable, but it takes them longer to do their job and their output is less. I do not want them thrown on the scrap heap because they are old, rather slow and cannot put in a full day's work. We have to bear in mind that the wages board has to be satisfied that age renders a person incapable of earning the statutory remuneration. If the Amendment is accepted, the employment of many tens of thousands of people after the war will be preserved. If it is not, that employment will be definitely destroyed.

Major Sir Derrick Gunston: The hon. Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) is very plausible, but he must remember that if this Amendment were accepted, it would destroy the Bill to a large extent. It would mean that after the war any old age pensioner and old person could be

employed at a much lower rate of wages. In practice, if there is an old man who has been a "boots" or something of that sort I have no doubt that his age would be taken into consideration and he would be covered by the Clause. If the Amendment were accepted, it would lead to the one thing we want to prevent. That is the employment of old age pensioners, and that would destroy the effect of the Bill.

Sir H. Williams: The hon. and gallant Gentleman has in effect supported my argument. The Clause says nothing about old age pensioners. A man may have an old age pension of £100 a week, but if he is not very fast the hon. and gallant Member says that he wants to employ him because he is old. I say that such a man should have the opportunity of getting employment. The hon. and gallant Gentleman because he does not understand the Clause would deprive him of that opportunity.

Major Petherick: I have understood the Government's point of view on most of the Amendments, although I have not agreed with them, but I do not think they have made a case out against this Amendment. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) has pointed out, these words are governed by what comes later:
which renders him incapable of earning the statutory remuneration.
Moreover, the wages board will have to be satisfied that the worker is incapable of earning a statutory remuneration because of age, if the Amendment is carried. I am convinced that if the Bill goes through in its present form there will be a number of hard cases of people who, as a result of the wages board decisions, the employer will find he can no longer keep in his employ. I hope that the Minister will not stick too rigidly to the wording of the Bill. The argument of the Parliamentary Secretary was not good enough and I hope the matter will be reconsidered.

Mr. McCorquodale: This provision is in all similar Acts, and there is nothing new about it. It would be undesirable to put in the word "age," because it would open the door widely and would suggest that anybody because of his age could offer his services below the rate laid down, and that would be a most mischievous thing.

Sir H. Williams: But the wages board have got to be satisfied.

Mr. Quintin Hogg: It seems to me that the Committee is arguing about nothing. I have seen these words in numerous Acts of Parliament, and I know of no Act under which any court would fail to find that age was an infirmity and was in certain circumstances a physical incapacity, or would fail to find that the only way in which old age could operate to reduce the earning capacity of a workman was through its operating in such a way as to be an infirmity or physical incapacity. The word suggested does nothing except to add a certain amount of confusion to the Clause.

Sir H. Williams: If it does nothing, what objection is there to putting it in?

Mr. Hogg: Because all unnecessary words add confusion to the construction of Statutes.

Amendment negatived.

Mr. Bevin: I beg to move, in Clause 8, page 7, line 45, at the end, to add:
(5) Where an employer employs any worker in reliance on any document purporting to be a permit granted under the last preceding sub-section authorising the employment of that worker at less than the statutory remuneration, then, if at or before the commencement of the employment, the employer has notified the wages board in question that, relying on that document, he is employing or proposing to employ that worker at a specified remuneration, the document shall, notwithstanding that it is not or is no longer a valid permit relating to that worker, be deemed (subject to the terms thereof) to be such a permit until notice to the contrary is received by the employer from the board.
This Amendment is moved as the result of representations made to me and of certain Amendments that were put on the Paper and it makes the Clause clearer than the original wording.

Amendment agreed to.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

Viscount Hinchingbrooke: I have been through Clause 8 with some care, and I cannot find that there is any safeguard to prevent an employer being proceeded against in a case where he has failed to pay a worker the statutory remuneration within the two-year period mentioned in this Clause but previous to the passage of the Bill. The

point is this: The Bill is passed, and the statutory remuneration is defined by a wages board. There should be some guarantee that an employer will not be penalised for paying wages below the statutory level at some time within the two-year period, but prior to the passage of the Bill. I hope the Solicitor-General will be able to say something by way of explanation.

Mr. Craik Henderson: While the learned Solicitor-General is considering his reply, I would like to put another point, one of considerable substance. Yesterday we had considerable discussion about tipping, and the Parliamentary Secretary explained the circumstances in which certain words would bear a certain meaning. For example, he said that in Clause 10 remuneration would not include tips, while where there was a reference to "benefits" I think he said it would. He also went into the question of the tronc. Suppose that the wages for a head waiter are fixed at £400 a year and the head waiter is receiving in tips £2,000 a year. Yes, there are head waiters who are receiving that sum. There is no doubt about it. If a head waiter receives a salary of £300 plus tips the employer is faced with a great problem, depending upon the circumstances described by the Parliamentary Secretary, in deciding whether those particular tips fall under the term "remuneration" or not. The head waiter's income works out at £2,300, but if the statutory minimum salary is £400 and the employer does not pay he is liable to prosecution. Because the Minister has not dealt definitely with tipping but is tackling in this indirect way, I feel it is a duty we owe to the people concerned to make clear somewhere in the Bill what the position is going to be. Otherwise there will be considerable injustice.

Mr. McCorquodale: The question of computation of remuneration comes under Clause 9.

The Solicitor-General: In answer to the point raised by my Noble Friend, I do not quite appreciate the difficulty which he has in mind. The Commission will be set up and will in certain cases make recommendations for a wages board to be instituted. The Minister will then appoint a wages board which will fix the statutory remuneration. After that the question will arise whether employers pay, but I do not think, as I see the matter,


that the question can arise of going back six years, because the statutory remuneration, as I envisage things at the moment, will not be retrospective and will not be in operation for periods before this Measure came into force.

Question, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill" put, and agreed to.

CLAUSE 9.—(Computation of remuneration.)

Mr. Bevin: I beg to move, in page 8, line 3, at the end, to insert "clear of all deductions."

Sir H. Williams: Perhaps this point came up yesterday and if so I apologise, but what are included in the term "deductions"? Would they include, say, Red Cross subscriptions?

The Solicitor-General: That will be found in Sub-section (1) of the Clause.

Amendment agreed to.

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

Rear-Admiral Beamish: I had put down an Amendment designed to free wages from any association with tips, and I should like to give my impression of what we are doing in passing this Clause. I have had an opportunity of looking carefully at the statements made yesterday by the Parliamentary Secretary when we had a long discussion on tipping. It seems clear, after reading Clause 9 and from what was said yesterday, that the Minister is determined to perpetuate the system of tipping, by which the public pay a considerable part of the wages of the workers in the catering industry. In my view—I still hold it—wages should not be imperilled by tips, whichever of the three forms that have been discussed tips may take. I take a serious view of this matter, because, so far as I know, never before have tips, or voluntary gifts, or whatever you like to call them, been enshrined or included in an Act of Parliament, and we are now perpetuating a system which, according to the impression I gained yesterday, was greatly deplored on all sides of the Committee. Hardly a speech has been made to-day on the subject of wages which has not stressed the point that what we are seeking to do

in this Bill is to make sure that the standard of wages is such that the workers will have no grumbles and that the public should therefore be able to avoid having to pay tips. I understand that one form of tipping is what is called the tronc system. I do not want to go into details—]

The Chairman: I must remind the hon. and gallant Gentleman that we had a very long discussion on the subject of tipping, and it would not be in Order to go over it again.

Rear-Admiral Beamish: I realise that that would be out of Order, but I would like to say this, which I do not think is out of Order: The way in which prize money used to be paid in the Navy was that it was poured through a ladder, and any money which stopped on the rungs of the ladder was paid to the men and the remainder was paid to the officers. I wish to put in my protest and to say that if we pass the Clause as it stands, we are going to perpetuate tipping in all three forms. I think that tipping is crude, unjust, unequal in its incidence, and undemocratic, and we are giving legal sanction to a custom which has never before been put into an Act of Parliament. Therefore, we should pause before we say "Aye" to this Clause, because in many ways it appears to be an irrevocable step and not a reform but an irretrievable recession, something which is contrary to the very object we set out to achieve. The Minister, who told us yesterday that he hated tipping, is now underpinning it and making it an absolute fixture for all time. If I were the Minister, I should not like to have that thought on my conscience.

Sir H. Williams: Let us face the fact that if it was included in the Ten Commandments, and we made yet an Eleventh Commandment, to abolish tipping, and if we passed 4,000 Acts of Parliament a year prohibiting tipping, people who wanted special services would continue to give tips. Let us face the fact that tipping exists and regulate it, rather than pretend that we can abolish it when we cannot. You might as well pass Acts of Parliament prohibiting betting and gambling; people would go on doing it.

Rear-Admiral Beamish: Gambling and that sort of enjoyment have nothing to do with conditions of work. Here we are concerned with the welfare of the workers.

Question, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill," put, and agreed to.

CLAUSE 10.—(Employers to keep records.)

Amendment made: In page 8, line 39, leave out from "shall," to the word "be," in line 40.—[Mr. Bevin.]

Sir H. Williams: I beg to move, in Clause 10, page 8, line 41, to leave out from "for" to the end of the Sub-section, and to insert "twelve months."
From every quarter we are urged by the Ministry of Supply to salvage documents and to scrap our records as soon as possible in order that they might be pulped and turned into a fresh form of paper. Recently this House has had Motions in front of it arising out of the question of destroying records kept by this House in order that paper might be available for salvage.

Mr. Montague: Was not the hon. Member supporting only a few days ago the idea of a General Election, which would have meant an extremely large use of paper?

Sir H. Williams: I have no recollection of supporting a General Election a few days ago. I was one of those opposed to having a register because it would waste an incredible amount of paper. Only to-day I opposed the putting of photographs upon registration cards because of the amount of waste involved. Therefore, my hon. Friend's interruption seems singularly inappropriate. I make the suggestion in the Amendment purely on practical grounds that unless there is proved necessity for keeping these documents for longer than 12 months they should be turned into salvage.

Mr. Leslie: We have already decided that action can be taken over a two-year period. Records ought therefore to be kept for that period and not for a shorter period.

Amendment negatived.

Clause, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 11 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

CLAUSE 12.—(Officers.)

Mr. Craik Henderson: I beg to move, in page 10, line 2, to leave out paragraph (a).
The Clause is rather an important one and it seems to create rather dangerous precedents. I should like to hear the views of the Solicitor-General on the matter. The paragraph is as follows:
An officer acting for the purposes of this Act may—

(a) require any person whom he has reasonable cause to believe to be, or to have been, a worker to whom this Act applies, or his employer, or the agent of his employer, to give such information as it is in his power to give with respect to the worker's remuneration (including holiday remuneration), his holidays and the other conditions of his employment, and to sign a written statement setting out that information."

This officer is entrusted with the job of investigating and interrogating people—not because they have committed any offence. I think this is a most dangerous innovation, and I cannot see an agent or an employer being very pleased at being asked to give information upon which someone may suffer certain penalties. It seems rather unfair to bring him in, in the circumstances. I should be very glad to hear from the Minister or the Solicitor-General whether this has ever been done in any Act before. Is it right to ask an agent or employer to make a statement in writing on which proceedings might follow? If it is being done for the first time I shall be glad to hear the reasons for the innovation.

Sir Patrick Hannon: This is an extraordinary innovation in the legislation of this House, and my hon. Friend has made out a definite case in his submission to the Minister. Would the Minister tell us precisely from where the officer is to receive his information? How does it come about that an officer can be appointed to go into a business, make these inquiries and get a written statement? I wonder what the Solicitor-General thinks about it. This is a new development in this country that officials can be appointed to make inquiries of this character and we ought to have some definite explanation about it in the House of Commons.

Mr. McCorquodale: I am advised that similar powers are required of workers, employers and agents under the trade boards legislation and in the Road Haulage Act, which this House passed only recently. The power is clearly essential for the enforcement of this Measure.

Mr. Craik Henderson: The hon. Gentleman has just said that under the Road Haulage Act an officer is entitled to get a written statement.

Mr. McCorqnodale: So I am advised. Apart from that, I am arguing that it is clearly essential, if this Measure is to mean anything, that there shall be powers to enforce it, and if it is to be enforced, officers must have these powers. Without them, enforcement will be almost impossible. Even about wages, additional information is often required, but on such subjects as board and lodgings, holidays and the like it will be essential for our officers to get information which can be vouched for. My hon. Friend may have noticed that we have put down an Amendment that no person need answer any question tending to incriminate himself. I am afraid I must insist that we must have these powers if we are to enforce the Bill.

Sir P. Hannon: How does the inquiry agent obtain his information in the first place before he begins to exercise these powers? Are we to have a system of espionage in operation all over the country?

Sir H. Williams: I think this wants a little more consideration. I heard groans from behind when several of us got up. Part of our purpose is to get some of those who groaned to start to read the Bill, which might improve their minds. The Clause says:
An officer acting for the purposes of this Act may—

(a) Require any person whom he has reasonable cause to believe to be, or to have been, a worker to whom this Act applies…."

Accordingly an officer can go into any catering establishment, can go to any employee there, and because in the mind of the officer, which is not a question that can be examined subsequently by the court, thinks that Bill Smith has some information—Bill Smith being an employee in this cafe, restaurant or hotel—he demands the information. Bill Smith refuses to give the information; the real reason may be that he has not got it. He is deemed to have obstructed the officer because, if Members will look at Subsection (6) they will see it says:
Any person who obstructs any officer acting for the purposes of this Act in the exercise of any power conferred by this section, or refuses to comply with any requirement of such an officer made in the exercise

of any such power, shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds.
Now here is conferred a right on an officer to go and interrogate any person whom he thinks he will interrogate who has been, or at the moment of the interrogation is, employed by a catering establishment and demand from him all sort of information which he may or may not possess. If that person says, "I do not know anything about it," the officer may not believe him. He is then deemed to be obstructing the officer and can be brought before the local "beak" and fined up to £20. That is going rather far. It is not merely an action against the employer; it is an action taken against every employee in the catering industry.

Mr. McCorquodale: For the purposes of greater accuracy, I have procured a copy of the Road Haulage Act, 1938. If the hon. Member will look at Section 11, paragraph (b), he will find the exact circumstances laid down.

Sir H. Williams: What is the penalty?

Mr. Watt: The Road Haulage Act provision has been, so far as I can recollect, brought almost word for word into this Bill. A far more apposite Act was the Factory Act, 1901. That Act contained a proviso, which the Minister has only put into this Bill now because of representations, that a person under interrogation by one of the officers was not bound to say anything which might incriminate himself. If those who have sought to make various Amendments to this Bill have done nothing else, they have done one good thing in getting that most essential proviso put into this Bill. I am glad the Minister has seen fit to meet us in that matter. I understand there is an Amendment down later on this question.
I confess I am troubled about this Clause, particularly this Sub-section which is before the Committee at the moment. The main difficulty really goes deeper. It is this: A Commission is appointed for the purpose of investigating conditions in the catering trade and making recommendations, appointing wages board, and so on. That Commission—it is rather a curious omission from the Bill—is given no power to convene any witnesses or to get any discovery of documents or to get any information as a Commission might


normally do, and the method by which apparently the Ministry has here seen fit to adopt is a perpetration of the unpopular war-time conception of the snooper. If I may say so, there is a sort of super-snooper appointed in this case, because almost every power under the sun is given to him, and we come across this extraordinarily wide Clause. I do not want to go beyond the scope of the Clause. It seems to me that the whole idea is objectionable. I can see why the Minister wants to give wide powers, and that the Commission is compelled to take these reports from these people and that they do not seem to have the power to do anything else.
Coming to the Clause itself, it provides that off his own bat some subordinate official appointed by the Minister can compel whoever he makes up his mind to interrogate, at any hour of the day, to sign statements; and, even with the proviso which is to be inserted, there remains the possibility that these people will be trapped into making statements which will incriminate them. It has to be remembered, too, that the very person who is taking these statements will be the prosecutor. That is another interesting novelty. This House has given this Measure a Second Reading, and has approved of it in principle. It is up to us now to see if we can make it a workable Bill. The right hon. Gentleman should reconsider this whole Clause, and see if he cannot find a better way of getting information.

Mr. Leslie: Some people think that this provision is something novel. They forget that it applies under the Shops Act, under which an inspector can enter a shop and demand to know whether the assistants are getting a proper meal hour, what is the closing time at night, and whether there are seats for the assistants.

Sir H. Williams: On a point of Order. The speech of the hon. Member relates to paragraph (c) and not to paragraph (a).

Mr. Leslie: Trade board inspectors have the right to inspect books, and to see that the proper wages are paid. I happened to be a member of a Tailoring trade board, and we had 365 logs, one for every day of the year. It is necessary for the inspector to find out how these logs are applied. There are apprentices, and the inspector has to look into their conditions.

I see no reason for any objection to the inspector getting information which is necessary if he is to see that the Act is complied with.

Lieutenant-Colonel Acland-Troyte: Reference has been made to the Road Haulage Act. Surely the officers employed under that Act are not given the powers which are given in Sub-section (4) of this Clause. I understand that the new proviso will simply mean that a person may refuse to give information which will incriminate himself. If he refuses to say anything to an inspector it will suggest that something is wrong, and it will tend to incriminate him. Everything that is necessary, I suggest, can be done under paragraphs (b) and (c), and (a) should be taken out.

Major Petherick: The fact that Parliament has decided previously to insert a certain form of words in an Act of Parliament, even if it is of a similar type to this Bill, does not necessarily mean that that form of words is the right one for all time. Hon. Members who have argued that are reactionary. Parliament in discussing a new Measure should, it is true, have due regard to precedent, but if the precedent has been found to be not satisfactory, or even dangerous, Parliament should reconsider the decisions of previous Parliaments. I do not like paragraph (a) at all. It means that anyone that the Minister can find in his Department, or whom he may beg, borrow or steal from another Department—for that is what the preamble to this Clause means—can come in and require any person he believes to be a worker or employer to give him all sorts of information verbally and indeed in writing. Is not all that kind of information that an inspector may require covered by paragraph (b)? Surely the operative evidence should be the wages sheet or the record of holidays. You should have certain specific things upon which the inspectors could rely for their information. It is not right to send along any inspector; it is offering him far too great powers, especially if he happens to be the wrong kind of man to have a roving commission to try and find out something which has gone wrong. It is putting power into the hands of an inspector which he ought not to be given. The right hon. Gentleman has already overloaded him, and I am not sure that the powers already conferred by Acts of


Parliament are not from time to time abused. Therefore, it is extremely dangerous for Parliament to pass a provision of this kind although a precedent has been created without further and very careful consideration.

Sir H. Williams: While the hon. Member for Sedgefield (Mr. Leslie) was talking, I raised a point of Order, because it seemed that his remarks were addressed to paragraph (c), which deals with entering the premises where the business is carried on in order to find out information. We are discussing paragraph (a), which contains nothing at all about entering. Under the provisions of that paragraph evidence can be demanded from a man in the street or a private house or anywhere where the officer searches for him, and if a man is asked for information in the street and in any way obstructs, he is liable to a penalty. As the hon. Member seemed to be under a slight misapprehension, I thought that the point ought to be made clear.

Amendment negatived.

Amendments made:

In page 10, line 3, leave out "this Act," and insert "a wages regulation order."

In line 11, leave out "this Act," and insert "a wages regulation order."

In line 17, leave out "this Act," and insert "a wages regulation order."—[Mr. Bevin.]

Mr. Bevin: I beg to move, in page 10, line 21, at the end, to insert:
Provided that no person shall be required under paragraph (a) of this Sub-section to answer any question or to give any evidence tending to criminate himself.

Mr. Craik Henderson: With regard to a person being bound to give evidence tending to incriminate himself, this seems to raise a difficulty for an agent who will be bound to give him evidence which might have the effect of incriminating his employer. This seems rather unfair.

Mr. Hogg: I wonder whether the Solicitor-General would deal with this point. It occurs to me that the proposed proviso is not well drafted. Paragraph (a) to which the proviso refers requires persons to give information in the form of a written statement. The proviso refers only to answering questions and giving

evidence, neither of which are directly referred to in paragraph (a). I question whether the proviso secures that no written statement under paragraph (a) can be required by an officer if it tends to incriminate the individual concerned.

Sir H. Williams: Surely it is the case that the officer asks questions and then writes out the statement based on those questions. The person is not asked to prepare a written statement; he is only asked to sign it.

The Solicitor-General: At the first stage the officer asks questions, and the Amendment meets that. Taking the second stage, when questions are asked and are reduced into writing, that would still be evidence against the person himself if it were produced. I am not quite sure what my hon. Friend the Member for Oxford (Mr. Hogg) is apprehending here, but if he will make it clear, I will endeavour to deal with it.

Mr. Hogg: If the proviso was really to be effective, the words should be:
provided that no person should be required to give information which can incriminate him-self.
That would cover the entire Sub-section by referring to the words used in it instead of using a different phrase, which may give rise to some misapprehension.

The Solicitor-General: I should have thought that this gave greater protection, but if my hon. Friend still thinks there is a doubt about it and will communicate with me, I shall be pleased to consider it again.

Mr. Craik Henderson: Can I have a reply to my question about agents who may have privileged conversations with their principals, and who may be bound to give information even though that may incriminate their principals?

The Solicitor-General: There is a long line of authority and statutory provision for dealing with a case where someone incriminates himself. I cannot think of any provision that is given for the protection of someone against the incrimination of his own employer. If my hon. Friend can find a similar provision in similar circumstances, I shall be pleased to consider it, but I should not like to make such a startling innovation in the law without very serious consideration.

Amendment agreed to.

Mr. Craik Henderson: I beg to move, in page 10, line 22, to leave out Sub-section (3).
This is another very objectionable provision and, in spite of the precedent of the Road Haulage Act and others, I think we should make a stand about it. It seems quite improper for the person who puts in this written statement to be the person to conduct the case and institute proceedings.

Mr. Colegate: I support the Amendment, because it is very important that there should not be the impression that the machinery of the Act is in force by some sort of inquisition or minor Gestapo. If the officer who has obtained the written statement is to conduct the proceedings, it seems that we are giving up one of the best institutions that operate in this country. It is very undesirable to have one person acting as prosecutor, information officer and police officer. He will be given such tremendous power that it will defeat its own object. It always happens that, if you place too much power in the hands of an officer, and people get the impression that the thing is not being conducted on the usual lines, prosecutions fail and there will be considerable prejudice against this officer and against the evidence that he offers to secure a conviction. That is a great mistake because it is essential that the Act should work effectively and that everyone connected with it should believe that the proceedings are conducted in accordance with the best traditions of British justice.

Sir J. Lamb: I am a strong supporter of trade unions. Can my hon. and learned Friend say whether this procedure is supported by his own trade union?

Mr. Goldie: I support the Amendment for a different reason Anyone who has had experience of police courts knows that proceedings are often carried on most effectively by the local sergeant or inspector. In this case think what is going to happen. The officer acting for the purposes of this Bill takes a statement. He then converts himself into the prosecuting counsel and somebody objects to the admissibility of the evidence on the ground that it was improperly obtained. What will happen if the man who has taken the statement is an advocate, and how can you determine whether or not the statement has been properly taken? In spite of the Solicitor-

General's ingenuity, I suggest that from a practical point of view this provision as drafted is absolutely unworkable.

The Solicitor-General: It is easier to deal with this matter in three stages—first, whether there is anything new about it; second, whether it is defensible on its merits; and third, whether I have infringed any trade union regulations in regard to it. With regard to the question whether there is any innovation, I may tell my hon. and learned Friends who are anxious about it that there is a similar provision in the Trade Boards Act, 1909, the Road Haulage Act, the Factories Act, the Agriculture Wages Act, the Unemployment Insurance Act, 1935, and the National Health Insurance Act, 1936. I am surprised that the immense experience of my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warrington (Mr. Goldie) at Manchester quarter sessions, has not brought one of these Acts before his judicial notice. Apart from the precedents, if we consider the matter on its merits I am a little surprised at the astonishment professed by my hon. Friends. They must know on a moment's reflection that anyone can bring proceedings. There is no special virtue in that. There are very few cases in which, if any person knows of a breach of the law, he cannot bring proceedings.
When we come to the question of those acting as advocates in the proceedings, there are many precedents, as I have said, but I would like my hon. Friends to face the practical points. Those of them who are in the law must know that there are thousands of private prosecutions brought in courts of summary jurisdiction every year. In the case of a private prosecution a solicitor conducts it; he prepares the prosecution, he takes the statements, calls the witnesses and argues the case. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Warrington can think of many great solicitor advocates in the North of England who have done that many times. That brings me to the point of my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mr. Colegate), whether those who are not lawyers should appear at all. The Committee has already shown its sense of the delicacy of my position, but I must make it clear that in certain special forms of litigation and prosecution, the great experience which officers like factory inspectors get in a particular class of case


makes them most valuable to the courts. I have on many occasions defended in cases in which the factory inspector has prosecuted. No one with any experience has, to my knowledge, anything to complain of about the fairness with which these cases are presented. I think that in the interests of our general desire to get on with the job and have the Bill workable, we might leave this provision as it is.

Sir S. Reed: The learned Solicitor-General has spoken of the manner in which solicitors excelled in this work, but surely solicitors work under the shadow of the Law Society, with severe pains and penalties and a strict code of conduct laid down in these matters, which would not apply to a "snooper" under this Measure.

The Solicitor-General: I know that my hon. Friend was only using the last phrase in the most Pickwickian sense and did not mean to say anything offensive in any way, but the point he raises is quite a serious one, and I have tried to answer it. I can only say that from my experience—and many hon. Members have seen this from another angle in their trade union experience—I have never found anything to complain about or heard any complaint about the way in which factory inspectors and people in the same position have done the work. I think that is the best answer.

Mr. Watt: No member of the legal profession can view with complete equanimity any suggestion that his job is so easy that a layman can take it over, without any experience. I have had considerable experience with lay magistrates and prosecutions under the Factory Acts in which I have discovered that lack of knowledge of the rules of evidence and procedure is not by any means a thing to be easily ignored, and if we are to have a set of men let loose on the country who have no such knowledge, it will not be in the interests of justice, particularly when those men are vested with the complete powers which they are given under this Bill. Of course we have had the precedent of the Road Haulage Act, which seems to have been a very bad precedent and not one that should be followed. The Factories Act, 1901, did, in fact, give power to officers to prosecute, but that is

very easily understood, first because technical questions like the fencing of machinery were matters upon which the officer was far better able to form a judgment and put his case than a non-technical man like a lawyer. Therefore, one can see why that power was given, but it is only right to point out that under the Factory Acts every officer does not have the power. If I recollect aright, it is only certain superior grades of officers. But in this Bill any officer, of whatever grade, without regard to his capabilities or lack of capabilities, is to be allowed to go into court and try his prentice hand as a lawyer.

Mr. Mathers: Will the hon. Member recognise that, in speaking as he has done, he was certainly not speaking for his constituency to which this particular Sub-section will not apply when the Bill becomes an Act of Parliament. This Sub-section does not apply to Scotland.

Earl Winterton: I have not taken part in discussions upon this Bill except in the shortest way. I am a supporter of the Government, but I desire to call attention to a very important and substantial point which has arisen. If I may say so without offence, I have seldom heard a more retrograde argument than that used by the many hon. and learned Gentlemen on the other side who have supported this Amendment. I have taken part on more than one occasion in discussions on the Measures cited by the Solicitor-General and I say that it was accepted as a matter of course by Parliament that in certain circumstances—and I am going to use the words, however much opposition there may be—we should not be burdened with advice either from barristers or solicitors, and that certain persons should be allowed to take action in the courts, whether they are officials or otherwise. We are now told by this galaxy of legal talent opposite that this is an extremely wrong principle. I rise only to say, speaking for myself and I think some others in this House, that we shall resist any attempt which is made, on this or future Bills, to prevent what has been a custom for many years, as the Solicitor-General said, namely, that persons who are not solicitors or barristers should be allowed to appeal. I had never heard such tenuous arguments put forward. It is not the case that solicitors or


barristers always prosecute in magistrates' courts. Constantly, as we all know, cases are brought by police officers, and the local superintendent of police puts the case. If we are to be told by these legal gentlemen that justice is not done unless one of their profession is in court, I say that that is a retrograde point of view, which has been rejected in Acts of Parliament after Acts of Parliament for the last 20 years.

Sir J. Lamb: Can a police officer conduct a case before the magistrates other than through the superintendent?

Flight-Lieutenant Raikes: The Noble Lord has made certain observations in regard to the legal profession, but, like the Noble Lord, I have had many opportunities, on the bench and elsewhere, of seeing experts dealing with these matters with reasonable efficiency and I have yet to hear the suggestion that members of the legal profession, as the Noble Lord hinted——

Earl Winterton: I not only hinted it, I have said it.

Flight-Lieutenant Raikes: The only advantage of the Amendment, if there is any advantage in it at all, is that the prosecution will be rather better done. All over the country in countless courts people do these jobs quite harmlessly.

Sir H. Williams: I am neither a lawyer nor a magistrate——

Mr. Kirkwood: What are you?

Sir H. Williams: I belong to the same profession as the hon. Member who interrupts. I am an engineer. The Noble Lord got the matter a little muddled. He spoke of his experience as a magistrate in Horsham or Worthing or wherever he sits in justice. What happens when a policeman decides to report him for a traffic offence is not that the same policeman acts as prosecutor and then goes into the box and gives evidence. The policeman gets the information and submits it to a superior police officer who decides whether there is to be a prosecution. The man who has collected the information then appears as a witness. That is the proper procedure—not that the person who gets the information should act as prosecutor and then go into the box and give evidence.

Mr. Murray: I am rather surprised at the attention which is being

given to the words set out here. In the large county of Durham we have a number of inspectors in connection with weights and measures. They get the information, take out a prosecution and conduct the case. They take the samples. They deal with the coal merchants. We have no trouble with this matter at all in Durham. It is exactly as set out in these words. In fact, it is part of the man's contract, it is part of his appointment when he takes on his job. He goes on the job and takes the samples; he goes to the coal salesman and deals with him. With milk it is exactly the same. Whatever comes underneath his particular appointment, he carries right to the court and carries on with the prosecution. That is not because we have not solicitors or barristers in Durham, but because we get satisfactory service rendered by these individuals. I cannot understand what we are wasting time about in this matter.

Mr. Goldie: I am grateful to the Noble Lord for including me in "the galaxy of legal talent," but no one with legal experience objects to officials conducting prosecutions. That is not the point I am putting before the Committee. I say this proposal will be absolutely unworkable for this reason. In the ordinary case which comes before the Noble Lord on the bench at Worthing, you may find objection taken to evidence. There will be no objection whatever under this Clause.

Earl Winterton: May I ask the hon. and learned Member in what way this procedure differs from the procedure so clearly expressed by the hon. Member for Spennymoor (Mr. Murray)?

Mr. Goldie: Yes, with the greatest pleasure. It is the preceding Sub-section which causes the difficulty. If there was not the Sub-section at the top of page 10, no difficulty would arise, but anyone who has had experience of defending in criminal cases knows that one acts on instructions. You may be told to make an objection that a statement has been improperly obtained. It is your duty to do so. The proceedings are then switched off, while the court determines whether or not the statement was properly taken. Evidence is called on one side and the other about whether the statement wag properly taken or hot, and the court rules according to the evidence. It is the commonest experience in a criminal court particularly


in indictments. What happens here is that, perfectly properly, the officer conducts the proceedings, but unfortunately that officer will be the man who has taken the statement. In my respectful submission, it will be a virtually impossible position if you have a man who is your learned friend at one moment and who then has to go from the advocates' seat to the witness box and be cross-examined by you. I agree with the Noble Lord in that I am not objecting to people who are not counsel or solicitors being allowed to conduct these proceedings. I say that something should be done to avoid causing difficulty in actual proceedings. I am sure that the Solicitor-General, with his great ability, will be able to find some way round the difficulty which he appreciates as much as I do.

Amendment negatived.

Amendment made: In page 10, line 31, leave out "or," and insert "and."—[Mr. Bevin.]

Dr. Peters: I beg to move, in page 10, line 35, at the end, to insert:
Provided that an officer acting for the purposes of the Act shall have no right of audience as a plaintiff suing in person in civil proceedings undertaken on behalf of or in the name of any such employee.
May I ask for an assurance from my hon. and learned Friend the Solicitor-General that there will not be a right of audience, as a plaintiff, for an officer of the Ministry, in civil—not criminal—proceedings of this kind?

Dr. Russell Thomas: I wish to support the Amendment. We have debated something of this kind in the last few minutes, but this Amendment does not apply to criminal proceedings. It is not clear in Sub-section (4) whether an official of the Ministry who is not a solicitor or barrister can appear in court in respect of civil proceedings under the Act. Parliament has always been very keen to make it clear that those who advocate civil causes should either be qualified under the Solicitors' Act or should have been called to the Bar by one of the Inns of Court, according to the court in which they appear. As recently as 1940 these matters came under review by this House, and it was pointed out to what extreme expense solicitors are put in taking their Articles when they first enter

the profession and by the cost of their practising certificates, and the dues which barristers are called upon to pay. We must remember that in civil actions it is in accordance with public policy that those learned in the law should conduct these cases in the courts, and that writs should be issued by solicitors. Barristers can be disciplined by their Inns, and solicitors are liable for wrongful advice and can be dealt with by the Law Society. These are safeguards to the public. In the Trade Board Act, 1901, and in the Road Haulage Act some sort of precedents are provided in this matter. We want to know whether they will be followed in respect of this Sub-section. I do not regard those precedents as being quite complete in themselves, and I would deplore that Acts of quite recent date should serve as precedents in regard to these matters. I trust that we shall have some definite assurance from the Solicitor-General in regard to this point.

The Solicitor-General: I understood that we had gone a long way towards meeting my hon. Friends by the last Amendment, which was in the rather cryptic form of substituting "and" for "or." The effect of that substitution is to bring about the position which my hon. Friends wish, and, apart from the legal consequences of that alteration, they may take it that as a matter of practice, the civil proceedings which they have in mind will be conducted by the Solicitor to the Ministry of Labour and National Service, who will act as a solicitor does in these cases, and instruct counsel. That is, as my hon. Friend will appreciate, a practice undertaking, which he understands very well.

Dr. Peters: Having regard to that undertaking, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Amendment made: In page 10, line 40, leave out from "possession," to "being," in line 41 [Mr. Bevin.]

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill."

Mr. Hely-Hutchinson: I have a comment to make on this Motion, as I have not known quite where to raise it. As I look through the Clause, there is, first of all, Sub-section (1), which provides for yet another category of Government official.


Sub-section (2, a) gives officials the power that caused an hon. Member to describe them as "snoopers." Sub-section (2, b) requires officials to have the qualities of an accountant; (2, c) gives them the power of entry at all times; Sub-section (3) gives them the qualities of a prosecuting attorney, and Sub-section (4) leaves with them the decision as to whether or not a suit shall be brought irrespective of whether the worker in question wishes it to be brought or not. Sub-section (5) gives an official power to act as an informer. When one considers all these matters taken together, one may well feel that it is a matter to which large enterprises will have to stand up and face, because they are accustomed to it and have the means of dealing with it. But I have to observe that these impositions can fall upon every boarding-house, small or large, along the entire front of Hastings and St. Leonard's, and that is something which may cause considerable concern, not only in Hastings and St. Leonard's, but also in similar constituencies throughout the country.

Mr. Levy: When I was referring to Clause 1, I called the attention of the Committee to the fact that every little house that took in a lodger would come within this category and that they would be subject to all the inspections that would take place with regard to this matter and to all the penalties that might be imposed for a breach of the provisions. This is very important, and my object in raising the matter here is not in order to detain the Committee, but to enter my protest. One of my chief objections to the Bill is the creation of a large number of inspectors who will be employed throughout the country for no other purpose than to form a sort of Gestapo with power to enter all these houses, which we, as Members of Parliament, ought not to allow.

Question, "That the Clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill," put, and agreed to.

Clause 13 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Whiteley): I beg to move, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again."

Sir H. Williams: Can the Parliamentary Secretary say when it is intended to resume the Committee stage?

Mr. Whiteley: On the first Sitting Day of the next series of Sittings.

Question put, and agreed to.

Committee report Progress; to sit again upon the next Sitting Day.

PURCHASE TAX (ALTERATION OF RATES)

PARTS OF MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

The Financial Secretary to the Treasury (Mr. Assheton): I beg to move,
That the Purchase Tax (Alteration of Rates) (No. 1) Order, 1943, dated 16th March, 1943, made by the Treasury under Section 20 of the Finance (No. 2) Act, 1940, a copy of which was presented to this House on 23rd March, be approved.
It is very seldom that the Government have an opportunity in these days of proposing a reduction of taxation. I have not any doubt that the House will welcome the reduction, even although it is a small one. In the last Finance Act the Purchase Tax on certain articles of luxury, or at any rate articles that were not essential, was increased from 33⅓ per cent. to 66⅔ per cent., and among these articles were strings and reeds of musical instruments. It was represented to the Chancellor of the Exchequer that not only were these strings and reeds the tools of trade of musicians and that they should have some consideration on that account, but it was also represented to him that the strings of tennis racquets were subject to only 33⅓ per cent. Purchase Tax. The heart of the Chancellor was wrung by the plaintive note of the musicians, and he decided that it was only right and proper to make the concession which is asked for in this Order and which is brought before the House to-day for that purpose.

Sir Herbert Williams: May I ask a question? What rate of Purchase Tax is charged has rather ceased to be a matter of interest, because the Treasury have produced a new device called "uplift," which has nothing to do with the moral condition of the people. If the Financial Secretary will examine the pertinent Section in the Finance Act under which Purchase Tax is collected, I think he will find—and I am only paraphrasing—that the Commissioners of Excise, in estimating the value of goods for the purpose of Purchase Tax, are required


to take into account what is a fair price as between a willing seller and a willing buyer. But instead of doing that they have, in a number of cases, struck an entirely artificial value, and I want to know something about this artificial value called "uplift." I have seen some correspondence with the Customs and Excise people on the matter which, quite frankly, I do not understand, and it appears that in every case when anybody tries to bring them to book by instituting proceedings they have promptly surrendered. It is a most extraordinary exploitation that is taking place, and I wonder whether it is going to take place on the question of musical instruments.

Sir Frank Sanderson: While fully in favour, of course, of the reductions suggested, why is it that this is of such immediate consequence, and why could he not wait until the Budget Statement?

Mr. Assheton: This is an Order which was before the House on 16th March, and it has to be confirmed within a certain number of days. In answer to the question of my hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams), I have nothing to say.

Question put, and agreed to.

Resolved,
That the Purchase Tax (Alteration of Rates) (No. 1) Order, 1943, dated 16th March, 1943, made by the Treasury under Section 20 of the Finance (No. 2) Act, 1940, a copy of which was presented to this House on 23rd March, be approved.

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

It being after the hour appointed for the Adjournment of the House, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.